What we’re reading (7/12)
“Earnings Kick Off With Sky-High Forecasts, Record Stock Market” (Wall Street Journal). “Wall Street is heading into earnings season this week with high expectations after strong profits fueled a stock market rally in the first half of the year. Money managers will be watching whether companies will again trounce Wall Street’s forecasts for earnings. The S&P 500 has gained 16% this year and notched 38 record closes, most recently on Friday.”
“This Company Sells Passports To Americans Looking For A Tax Break On Their Bitcoin Profits” (CNBC). “Russian expatriate Katie Ananina has spent the last three years helping people dodge taxes on their bitcoin gains. It is all part of her mission to stick it to the man, one case of tax avoidance at a time. As the name suggests, Plan B Passport offers crypto-rich clients a path to a second passport in their pick of seven, mostly tropical, tax-haven states, all of which are exempt from capital gains taxes on crypto holdings.”
“The Pandemic Has Widened The Wealth Gap. Should Central Banks Be Blamed?” (The Economist). “The global financial crisis of 2007-09 was socially divisive as well as economically destructive….[But] [t]he share of global wealth held by the top “one percent” actually fell in 2008. The pandemic has been different. Amid all the misery and mortality, the number of millionaires rose last year by 5.2m to over 56m, according to the Global Wealth Report published by Credit Suisse, a bank. The one percent increased their share of wealth to 45%, a percentage point higher than in 2019.”
“You Know, When Credit Suisse Really Thinks About It, Maybe It Should Have Someone Reviewing Counterparty Risk” (Dealbreaker). “Ideally, you’d hire a person to keep an eye on the risks your counterparties are taking before one of them costs you $5.5 billion, many legal bills, a great deal of talent, maybe an antitrust prosecution and the ire of the Swiss people. Of course, no one does this, and anyway Credit Suisse was spending that money keeping an eye on its own employees rather than on the likes of Archegos Capital Management which, it admits in retrospect, was a poor allocation of resources for a lot of reasons.”
“For A $12.50 Raffle Ticket, The Keys To Drug Lord El Chapo’s Seized Safe House In Mexico Await” (Washington Post). “The Mexican government is raffling off the site of Guzmán’s dramatic escape, along with seven other houses, seven apartments, five lots, a ranch, and a 20-seat viewing box at the Azteca Stadium in Mexico City. The prizes — confiscated assets from various criminal operations and now owned by the government — are valued at a total of $12.5 million. Lottery tickets cost 250 pesos ($12.50). Winning tickets will be drawn on Sept. 15, the day before Mexico’s Independence Day.”
