QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I have a question about Blackrock buying up all these homes. It seems that the Dodd-Frank bill empowered Blackrock to buy up all of these homes and rent them out. Was this all rigged for their benefit?
Thank you for being a rare light of truth in these dark times.
ED
ANSWER: Dodd-Frank Title XIV establishes minimum standards for all mortgage products. It was a very clever piece of legislation that I would suspect Blackrock had a hand in creating. It prevents making a home mortgage loan unless they reasonably determine that the borrower can repay the loan based on the borrower’s credit history, current income, expected income, and other factors. The solution was to stiffen regulations to trap people into being perpetual renters and in reality shuts them down from ever owning a home. This has created the marketplace for Blackrock. It would be one hell of a coincidence that this provision came from a politician who did not understand the economy. It has the fingerprints of something much more sinister.
The Dodd-Frank Act effectively legislated that banks cannot allow a low-income person to own a home. Obama claimed that to make sure that a crisis like this never happens again, he signed the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act into law which was indeed the most far-reaching Wall Street reform in history. It was pitched that the Dodd-Frank legislation would prevent the excessive risk-taking that led to the financial crisis. Yet it did so by outlawing home ownership for the low-income and trapping them as perpetual rental clients for Blackrock. That was very convenient. Quite a few hands were in the cookie jar on this one. The wording was discriminatory for the potential home buyer rather than targeting the practices of the banks who made the mortgages and resold them. The better way would be to penalize the original mortgage lender for their lack of fiduciary duty than to codify restrictions on the consumer.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 5, 2023 | Sundance
The New York Times has gained insider information on the current advertising revenue for the social media platform Twitter. [Article Here] Ignoring the nonsense narrative engineering and just focusing on the data itself, the revenue side for Twitter is half what we previously estimated. This makes the overlay for decisions on platform content even more stark.
According to the data, ad revenue for the month of April was a lackluster $88 million. That’s a pace of just over $1 billion a year. With a pre-Musk operating expense of $4.5 billion, and pre-Musk revenue at $4 billion cited by the Twitter owner as the backdrop, here’s the outlook.
Assuming post Musk labor cost reductions saved $500 million, a decline in revenue to $1 billion/yr would be a $3.0 billion deficit, to wit you would need to add the $1.5 billion in debt service as part of the investor buyout structure.
That puts Twitter into a $4.5 billion loss ballpark per year.
(New York Times) – Twitter’s U.S. advertising revenue for the five weeks from April 1 to the first week of May was $88 million, down 59 percent from a year earlier, according to an internal presentation obtained by The New York Times. (read more)
$1 billion per year in advertising revenue is a whopping 75% loss from the claimed $4 billion in revenue before the Musk purchase. Perhaps the Fidelity estimate of company value at $15 billion is closer to reality.
If the value of Twitter has dropped to the $15 billion level, that means almost all of the $30 billion in personal equity Musk put into the company has been lost.
Current investor debt is $12.5 billion, with $1.5 billion in debt service/yr. A valuation of $15 billion would only leave Musk with around $2.5 billion in equity position. If the valuation is accurate, Musk personally would have lost around $27.5 billion in this Twitter platform purchase.
The last time I outlined the Twitter financial position, several people took exception to the data as shared. However, the data is from Elon Musk himself, and I will again post the video at the bottom of the article.
Revenue is now Elon Musk’s #1 priority. All other platform decisions are going through the prism of financial viability.
Twitter CEO Elon Musk has provided some convincing commentary about his willingness to forgo revenue in order to retain “free speech.” However, more recently he has qualified that outlook by saying, “Freedom of speech is not the same as freedom of reach.” Musk noting Twitter will block, remove, censor, shadow ban, deboost, downrank and stop content from amplifying based on the determination of those in charge of Twitter content.
This controlled “freedom of reach” perspective, which is really shadow-banning in practice, is generally accepted and now admitted. Against this backdrop, it becomes important to understand the priorities of the platform to understand the guidelines of the platform. Within this context the financials are key to understanding what elements are included within “approved content.” {GO DEEP}
Twitter is now a private company, therefore understanding the financials of Twitter is a little more challenging than when they were required to post their financial statements publicly. However, Elon Musk gave an interview with the Babylon Bee yesterday and revealed some of the internal financial challenges. [VIDEO HERE] I am going to summarize the status of the Twitter financial position according to what Musk himself revealed.
♦ Twitter was initially purchased by Musk and his investors for around $44 billion. The company now estimates its value around $20 billion. Last week, the mutual funds giant Fidelity, which owns shares in Twitter, valued the company at $15 billion. Bottom line, Musk grossly overpaid.
♦ Musk put roughly $30 billions of his own net worth into the purchase and financed the rest.
♦ Current outstanding debt on the financing for the purchase is around $12.5 billion. Per Musk statement.
♦ Current debt service, interest on the loans (from investors), is roughly $1.5 billion/yr. $120.5 million per month for debt service. Per Musk statement.
♦ Previous revenue (when public) was roughly $4 billion/yr. Twitter was generally breaking even.
♦ Advertising revenue, as a result of changes in industry in combination with concerns about Twitter, are “half” what they were during the acquisition phase, per Musk statement. That puts current advertising revenue around $2 billion/yr. Per NYT report that’s now $1 billion/yr.
♦ Per conversation, current status of Twitter is -$3 billion/yr and could be as high as -$4 to 5 billion/yr.
The NYT revenue leak now makes the top side of this scale make sense. If $4 billion in revenue was generally the breakeven point (before acquisition), and now they have $2 billion $1 billion in revenue and $1.5 billion in additional debt service [as they trim operational costs (including labor) to offset].
♦♦ For the bottom line to be an operational loss of $3 to $5 billion (est) per year, Twitter is generally losing around $300 million per month.
♦ There is only so much Tesla stock Musk can sell to support Twitter. He has limits. Per conversation.
♦ Twitter has around $1 billion in liquid cash available. Per conversation. With a burn rate of $300+ million a month.
Twitter is in locked contracts with AWS and Google cloud services through 2025 at roughly $300 million per year for both [AWS $100 million, Goog $200 million].
Twitter Blue subscriptions are around 180,000 users, paying $11/mo. That’s around $2 million a month; pittance in comparison to what he needs.
There’s your prism for platform content!
Elon Musk needs revenue desperately.
Twitter urgently needs advertising revenue.
Without revenue or acquisition of another platform (with assets) to offset the current status of Twitter, it is only a matter of time before some form of bankruptcy. [Note, Twitter investors are backstopped with Tesla/SpaceX as collateral against default.]
The tightrope… Elon Musk must appease the Google advertising control agents and adhere to content rules and regulation (DEI etc.) in order to maximize his revenue. That’s where Linda Yaccarino comes in as a critical player.
Bottom line, Musk has to make decisions through one prism, THE ECONOMICS. Musk’s decision-making, pro freedom or not, is constrained by this financial dependency. Hence, a lot of the platform censorship elements remain (including some personnel) and now the outreach to appoint Google/WEF approved Linda Yaccarino in an effort to enhance the revenue.
When you are perplexed about Musk decision making…. THERE’S YOUR ANSWER.
The recent relationship between Elon Musk and the Rupert Murdoch media enterprise, now makes even more sense.
Posted originally on the CTH on June 5, 2023 | Sundance
Here we go again with the ever-familiar silo defense. The FBI is refusing to hand over the unclassified FD-1023 stating there is an ongoing investigation using the confidential human source who made allegations outlined in the document. Remember, the allegations and the statement record was created in July of 2020, almost three years ago.
Prior to last week, the FBI refused to say the 6-page unclassified document existed. After House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer told FBI Director Chris Wray he had already seen the unclassified document via a whistleblower, then Comey admitted the FBI indeed had it. Today, the FBI is refusing to release the document, stating it is now captive as part of an “ongoing investigation.” The claimed investigation began July 2020 – the investigation is “ongoing”. Go figure.
James Comer said he will begin the process, this Thursday, to hold FBI Director Christopher Wray in contempt of Congress. WATCH:
A brief post just to emphasize a point about DC and how the power centers protect themselves. You might remember when Attorney Jeff Sessions was told he needed to recuse himself from anything to do with the Trump-Russia investigation. We know from FOIA requests of schedules, the participants in the meeting on the date of those discussions:
Jeff Sessions was forced to recuse himself at the conclusion of a meeting involving Jody Hunt, Dana Boente, Jim Crowell, Tashina Guahar and Scott Schools; an apparent conflict of interest. Now consider….
Mary McCord was Acting Asst. Attorney General for the National Security Division, when she submitted the fraudulently constructed FISA application used against Carter Page. Mary McCord, knowingly and with specific intent, defrauded the court and broke the law. Mary McCord then went on to join Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler in the construction of the articles of impeachment. She did not recuse herself.
At the time the Carter Page application was filed (October 21, 2016), Mary McCord’s chief legal counsel inside the office was a DOJ-NSD lawyer named Michael Atkinson. In his role as the legal counsel for the DOJ-NSD, it was Atkinson’s job to review and audit all FISA applications submitted from inside the DOJ. Essentially, Atkinson was the DOJ internal compliance officer in charge of making sure all FISA applications were correctly assembled and documented. McCord and Atkinson knowingly submitted a fraudulent FISA application.
Atkinson then went on to become Intelligence Community Inspector General where he changed the rules for CIA whistleblowers to allow the accusation against President Trump to surface which resulted in an impeachment investigation. When ICIG Michael Atkinson turned over the newly authorized anonymous whistleblower complaint to the joint House Intelligence and Judiciary Committee (Schiff and Nadler chairs), who did Michael Atkinson give the complaint to? Mary McCord.
Consider the conflicts within the Supreme Court. Mary McCord, knowingly and with specific intent, lied to the FISA court to support the FBI targeting of Trump. Mary McCord’s husband, Sheldon L Snook, was running the office of the counselor to Chief Justice John Roberts; the office which would intercept any communication from the FISA court to the Chief Justice if the FISA court had any concerns about the false FBI application. No one from the office, or the Chief Justice counselor recused themselves.
Conflicts of interest only surface to create personnel changes when those changes meet the interests of the DC administrative state. When those conflicts exist but they are useful to the interests of the DC administrative state, they are ignored.
Women are being forced out of athletics. Facts over feelings, but biological males are athletically superior to women. Numerous successful female athletes have been forced into early retirement due to men competing as women. The men who compete against women would be considered mediocre in the men’s categories but are breaking records as women.
Men have 10X the testosterone of women. Those who are taking estrogen still have an advantage. A male athlete has more muscle mass than a female athlete, allowing them to have a higher capacity for hypertrophy. Men have a higher basal metabolic rate as well, allowing them to lose weight quicker and that muscle mass to body weight ratio enables them to be faster on their feet. Male athletes have 4% to 12% body fat, compared to female athletes, who have 12% to 23%. Women have smaller hearts (physically) than men, and their hearts must pump faster during exercise. Women also have fewer red blood cells than men, enabling them to absorb oxygen at a higher rate. Men are larger overall, with wider chests and longer limbs. Male athletes clearly have an advantage, which is why no one expected women to compete against men until the trans agenda exploded in our faces.
Duke compared top athletes in their field and found that men clearly have the advantage. “Just in the single year 2017, Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion Tori Bowie’s 100 meters lifetime best of 10.78 was beaten 15,000 times by men and boys. (Yes, that’s the right number of zeros.) The same is true of Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion Allyson Felix’s 400 meters lifetime best of 49.26. Just in the single year 2017, men and boys around the world outperformed her more than 15,000 times.” The researchers noted that the difference has nothing to do with training. Men are superior at sports because they have an androgenized body. Women will always come second to biological males in strength, endurance, and speed.
Biological men are destroying women’s sports. We all know of the case of Lia Thomas who beat 12-time All-American champion Riley Gaines. Lia is 6’1 and towers over her teammates who do not even feel comfortable sharing a locker room with a biological male. Thomas ranked in the mid 500s while competing as man, and then began to shatter records after switching to the female category. These trans athletes are creating new records that women physically cannot beat, diminishing the achievements of women in sports.
The Democrats fully support men competing with women. The Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act passed in a 219-203 vote in April, with all Republicans voting “yes” and all Democrats voting “no.” “We should rename it the ‘cancel kids trans hate’ bill,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash) stated. Why are the Democrats attempting to turn this into a social issue? Facts over feelings – men excel at sports and should not be permitted to compete as women.
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