Stocks are dropping — Three reasons:
+ The Fed held open the idea of another rate increase. In other words, there will be another rate increase. Don’t fight the Fed and all that. Stocks will go down further.
+ Gurus believe stocks are overpriced compared with fixed income — like treasuries. I bought some six month treasuries yesterday at 5.51%. My bank offered me a CD at 6%, which is amazing since they pay virtually nothing on their own walk-in savings accounts.
+ The buzz has evaporated from AI specifically and tech stocks in general. Now financial writers are talking about high ultra-high P/Es and unpredictable China risks. And how there are huge risks from AI, which will destroy humanity (which I don’t believe).
All of the stocks I own are down today. This gives depression a whole new meaning.
Crave a small fortune? Start with a large one.
I did not sell my stock in Apple, nor my stock in Nvidia, which is cratering. I have been mulling. Readers chimed that I was an idiot to even think about selling a magnificent company like Apple. Apple is finally getting more buzz in the press for its new stuff, like the iPhone 15. Sadly, Apple’s iPhone sales have been declining recently. I don’t see any strong reasons why the iPhone 15 will be the BIG savior. But that’s me. I want excitement, with a capital E. For now, I’m not buying an iPhone 15, though I did buy a new Apple Watch.
At present my holdings of fixed income exceed what I have in equities. Which may now, for once, be “correct” for my age — a geriatric 81.
Best ideas
+ Don’t try to unsubscribe, which doesn’t work. Change your profile to something crazy — like HarryIdiot@harryidiot.com
+ It’s time to cancel all your cable and satellite TV subscriptions and go straight to YouTubeTV. If you don’t have a smart TV, buy a Roku. They cost nothing and work perfectly.
+ If you’re annoyed at your providers, call and ask for the Customer Retention Office. They have really good deals.
This stuff is seriously good
Put it on the back of your hands. It’s the easiest and cheapest ($3.97) way not to look old. Click here.
Every dermatologist says put sunscreen on your face before you go out in the morning.
My Personal health
+ I’m about to get a Endoscopy and Colonoscopy. Good idea to get them both at once, under the one anesthetic. Thus one chance of dieing from a bad anesthetic. My doctor actually told me that comforting piece of information.
+ I just got the latest Covid shot which covers all the variants. Also I got the RSV shot. I got them at CVS which is the best place.
+ Blueberries, milk and Cheerios is my go-to breakfast. It’s boring, but blueberries are The Magic Elixir to a long healthy life.
My personal sanity
I like buying shoes and bags. It’s my therapy.
But it’s all over. Sadly.
My space to put all the crap is filled and then some. Time to give the stuff away — which takes longer than buying it.
Thank you Amazon.
Kim Jong-un pledges to support Russia ‘in fight against imperialism’
Kim met with Putin.
Kim is a fat slob. In my book he ranks as the world’s worst dictator. While he gorges himself on wine (France’s best), women (North Korea’s best) and song, his country is starving. On June 14, the BBC wrote:
People in North Korea have told the BBC food is so scarce their neighbors have starved to death.
Exclusive interviews gathered inside the world’s most isolated state suggest the situation is the worst it has been since the 1990s, experts say.
The government sealed its borders in 2020, cutting off vital supplies. It has also tightened control over people’s lives, our interviewees say.
The BBC has secretly interviewed three ordinary people in North Korea, with the help of the organisation Daily NK which operates a network of sources in the country. They told us that since the border closure, they are afraid they will either starve to death or be executed for flouting the rules. It is extremely rare to hear from people living in North Korea.
The interviews reveal a “devastating tragedy is unfolding” in the country, said Sokeel Park from Liberty in North Korea (LiNK), which supports North Korean escapees.
One woman living in the capital Pyongyang told us she knew a family of three who had starved to death at home. “We knocked on their door to give them water, but nobody answered,” Ji Yeon said. When the authorities went inside, they found them dead, she said. Ji Yeon’s name has been changed to protect her, along with those of the others we interviewed.
A construction worker who lives near the Chinese border, whom we have called Chan Ho, told us food supplies were so low that five people in his village had already died from starvation.
“At first, I was afraid of dying from Covid, but then I began to worry about starving to death,” he said.
North Korea has never been able to produce enough food for its 26 million people. When it shut its border in January 2020, authorities stopped importing grain from China, as well as the fertilisers and machinery needed to grow food.
Meanwhile, they have fortified the border with fences, while reportedly ordering guards to shoot anyone trying to cross. This has made it nearly impossible for people to smuggle in food to sell at the unofficial markets, where most North Koreans shop.
A market trader from the north of the country, whom we have named Myong Suk, told us that almost three quarters of the products in her local market used to come from China, but that it was “empty now”.
She, like others who make their living selling goods smuggled across the border, has seen most of her income disappear. She told us her family has never had so little to eat, and that recently people had been knocking on her door asking for food because they were so hungry.
From Pyongyang, Ji Yeon told us she had heard of people who had killed themselves at home or disappeared into the mountains to die, because they could no longer make a living.
There was a huge famine in the 1990s in North Korea. According to Wikipedia:
The North Korean Famine (Korean: 조선기근), also known as the Arduous March or the March of Suffering[6] (고난의 행군), was a period of mass starvation together with a general economic crisis from 1994 to 1998 in North Korea. …
The famine stemmed from a variety of factors. Economic mismanagement and the loss of Soviet support caused food production and imports to decline rapidly. A series of floods and droughts exacerbated the crisis. The North Korean government and its centrally planned system proved too inflexible to effectively curtail the disaster. …
Estimates of the death toll vary widely. Out of a total population of approximately 22 million, somewhere between 240,000 and 3,500,000 North Koreans died from starvation or hunger-related illnesses, with the deaths peaking in 1997.
Sell at Rosh Hashanah, Buy back at Yom Kippur
This idiotic adage sometimes works. Sometimes doesn’t. This year it will work because it’s been down. Hence it will rise after Monday when Yom Kippur is celebrated.
Yom Kippur is The Day Atonement. You’re meant to fast all day. That may be why this arose:
There are three essences to a Jewish holiday:
+ They tried to kill us.
+ They failed.
+ So, let’s eat.
You can start eating after the sun sets on Monday.
The best Yom Kippur joke — The Talking Parrot
Meyer, a lonely widower, was walking home along Delancy Street one day wishing something wonderful would happen in his life, when he passed a pet store and heard a squawking voice shouting out in Yiddish,”fQuawwwwk…vus machts du?”
Meyer rubbed his eyes and ears. Couldn’t believe it. Perfect Yiddish.
The proprietor urged him, “Come in here, fella, and check out this parrot…”
Meyer did. An African Grey cocked his little head and said: “Vus? Kenst sprechen Yiddish?”
In a matter of moments, Meyer had placed five hundred dollars on the counter and carried the parrot in his cage away with him. All night he talked with the parrot in Yiddish. He told the parrot about his father’s adventures coming to America. About how beautiful his late wife, Sarah, was. About his family. About his years of working in the garment district. About Florida .
The parrot listened and commented.
They shared some walnuts.
The parrot told him of living in the pet store, how lonely he would get on the weekends. They both went to sleep.
Next morning, Meyer began to put on his Tfillin, all the while saying his prayers. The parrot demanded to k now what he was doing and when Meyer explained, the parrot wanted to do the same. Meyer went out and had a miniature set of tfillin hand made for the parrot.
The parrot wanted to learn to daven (to pray)and learned every prayer. He even wanted to learn to read Hebrew.
So Meyer spent weeks and months, sitting and teaching the parrot, teaching him Torah In time, Meyer came to love and count on the parrot as a friend and fellow Jew
One morning, on Rosh Hashanah (that was nearly ten days ago), Meyer rose and got dressed and was about to leave when the parrot demanded to go with him. Meyer explained that Shul (synagogue) was not a place for a bird, but the parrot made a terrific argument, so Meyer relented and carried the bird to Shul on his shoulder.
They made quite a spectacle, and Meyer was questioned by everyone, including the Rabbi and the Cantor. They refused to allow a bird into the building on the High Holy Days, but Meyer persuaded them to let him in this one time, swearing that the parrot could daven. Wagers were made with Meyer.
Thousands of dollars were bet that the parrot could NOT daven, could not speak Yiddish or Hebrew, etc.
All eyes were on the African Grey during services. The parrot perched on Meyer’s shoulder as one prayer and song passed – Meyer heard not a peep from the bird. He began to become annoyed, slapping at his shoulder and mumbling under his breath, “Daven!”
Nothing.
“Daven..parrot, you can daven, so daven…come on, everyone is looking at you!”
Nothing.
After Rosh Hashanah services were concluded, Meyer found that he owed his Shul buddies and the Rabbi over four thousand dollars..
He marched home, so upset he said nothing to the parrot.
Finally several blocks from the Temple the Parrot began to sing an old Yiddish song, as happy as a lark.
Meyer stopped and looked at him.
“Why? After I had tfillin made for you and taught you the morning prayers, and taught you to read Hebrew and the Torah. And after you begged me to bring you to Shul on Rosh Hashana, why? WHY?!? Why did you do this to me?”
“Meyer, don’t be a schmuck,” the parrot replied.
“Think of the odds we’ll get on Yom Kippur!”
Yom Kippur begins this Sunday night.
See soon. — Harry Newton
