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Israeli director Gidi Dar’s son has just been called up to the army reserves. Dar, whose 2021 movie “Legends of Destruction” warned about the dangers of in-fighting in modern-day Israel by recounting the Biblical-era story of the destruction of the Jewish temple, is angry. Angry at his government,…
#israeli #gididar #legendsofdestruction #israel #jewish #hamas #israelis #vespasian #jews #jerusalem
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Consumers, rejoice: Mozilla Firefox is testing a feature that will detect and identify fake reviews left on products on ecommerce sites like Amazon, and automatically re-adjust scores after their exclusion. The feature has been in the works for some time, too – Mozilla acquired the website and…
#mozillafirefox #amazon #firefox #flushingoutfakes #mozilla #yelp #ebay #surfshark #google
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Wall Street is reluctant to get too bearish on a stock, but when it does, it can be worth paying attention—especially when the analysts agree that a stock isn’t a Buy.
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BANGKOK — With low-income people in mind, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, who took office in August, promised to raise the minimum wage and hand out 10,000 baht ($270) in digital money to every Thai aged 16 and older. The decision is a reminder of "Thaksinomics," the economic set of…
#thai #sretthathavisin #thaksinomics #shinawatra #thaksin
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The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday put itself in the soft-landing camp for the global economy as inflationary pressures ease. But it sees anemic growth and numerous challenges ahead—from volatility in commodities markets to China’s troubled property sector.
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Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Harvard Professor Claudia Goldin won this year's Nobel Prize in economics, Simone Biles became the most decorated gymnast ever, and Fortune senior editor Claire Zillman shares highlights from Sen. Laphonza Butler's appearance at Day 1 of Fortune's Most Powerful…
#broadsheet #harvard #claudiagoldin #nobelprize #simonebiles #fortune #clairezillman #laphonzabutler #gavinnewsom #butler
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Avalanche made headlines for the key partnerships forged and improvements in on-chain activity throughout Q3.
#q3
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New homes under construction in Miami, Florida, Sept. 22, 2023.
Joe Raedle | Getty Images
Top real estate and banking officials are calling on the Federal Reserve to stop raising interest rates as the industry suffers through surging housing costs and a “historic shortage” of available homes for sale.
In a letter Monday addressed to the Fed Board of Governors and Chair Jerome Powell, the officials voiced their worries about the direction of monetary policy and the impact it is having on the beleaguered real estate market.
The National Association of Home Builders, the Mortgage Bankers Association and the National Association of Realtors said they wrote the letter “to convey profound concern shared
among our collective memberships that ongoing market uncertainty about the Fed’s rate path is contributing to recent interest rate hikes and volatility.”
The groups ask the Fed not to “contemplate further rate hikes” and not to actively sell its holdings of mortgage securities at least until the housing market has stabilized.
“We urge the Fed to take these simple steps to ensure that this sector does not precipitate the hard landing the Fed has tried so hard to avoid,” the group said.
The letter comes as the Fed is weighing how it should proceed with monetary policy after raising its key borrowing rate 11 times since March 2022.
In recent days, several officials have noted that the central bank could be in a position to hold off on further increases as it assesses the impact the previous ones have had on various parts of the economy. However, there appears to be little appetite for easing, with the benchmark fed funds rate now pegged in a range between 5.25%-5.5%, its highest in some 22 years.
At the same time, the housing market is suffering through constrained inventory levels, prices that have jumped nearly 30% since the early days of the Covid pandemic and sales volumes that are off more than 15% from a year ago.
The letter notes that the rate hikes have “exacerbated housing affordability and created additional disruptions for a real estate market that is already straining to adjust to a dramatic pullback in both mortgage origination and home sale volume. These market challenges occur amidst a historic shortage of attainable housing.”
At recent meetings, Powell has acknowledged dislocations in the housing market. During his July news conference, the chair noted “this will take some time to work through. Hopefully, more supply comes on line.”
The average 30-year mortgage rate is now just shy of 8%, according to Bankrate, while the average home price has climbed to $407,100, with available inventory at the equivalent of 3.3 months. NAR officials estimate that inventory would need to double to bring down prices.
“The speed and magnitude of these rate increases, and resulting dislocation in our industry, is painful and unprecedented in the absence of larger economic turmoil,” the letter said.
The groups also point out that spreads between the 30-year mortgage rate and the 10-year Treasury yield are at historically high levels, while shelter costs are a principal driver for increases in the consumer price index inflation gauge.
As part of an effort to reduce its bond holdings, the Fed has reduced its mortgage holdings by nearly $230 billion since June 2022. However, it has done so through passively allowing maturing bonds to roll off its balance sheet, rather than reinvesting. There has been some concern that the Fed might get more aggressive and start actively selling its mortgage-backed securities holdings into the market, though no plans to do so have been announced.
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The cryptocurrency industry and community are abuzz with the latest Bitcoin update: BitVM. This computing paradigm, designed to express Turing-complete Bitcoin contracts, has the potential to revolutionize the Bitcoin network. What is even more intriguing is that this does not require any changes…
#bitvm #bitcoin #ethereum #nft #bitcoinbitvm
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prices increased by more than 7% in early Tuesday trading as the market remained in the red. A few cryptocurrencies, including Tezos, were up as the global crypto market capitalization fell 1% to $1.08 trillion. At the time of writing, XTZ was up 7.36% in the last 24 hours to $0.703. This is…
#xtz #nft #manchesterunited
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The News Some U.S. lawmakers are calling for more restrictions on seafood imports from China following an investigation exposing grave human rights abuses throughout the country’s fishing industry. The findings are the culmination of a four-year probe by reporter Ian Urbina’s Outlaw Ocean Project.…
#ianurbina #outlawoceanproject #zhenfa7 #newyorker #shandong #uyghurs #xinjiang #northkorean #urbina #chrissmith
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Canadian auto workers are striking against , raising the pressure on the car maker as it also copes with the United Auto Workers strike in the U.S.
#unitedautoworkers
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Treasuries jumped and shares advanced after comments by Federal Reserve officials fueled speculation the US central bank may stand pat until year-end. • None Israel Latest: Top US General Warns Iran to Stay Out of Conflict • None Israel Latest: Over 1,100 Dead; US Sends Warships to Region The…
#federalreserve #warnsiran #treasury #israel #mscis #asiapacific #philipjefferson #fedbank #dallas #lorielogan
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Sign up to our 10 Things You Need to Know Today newsletter A free daily digest of the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from our website Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Thank you for signing up to TheWeek. You will receive a verification email…
#theweek #termsconditions #telegraph #jamesjacksoniii #afcrumney #walesonline #elizabethii #shropshire #charles #camilla
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A Bitcoin developer has proposed a new way to bring more expressive off-chain smart contracts to Bitcoin (BTC) without needing a soft fork. Announced in an Oct.9 white paper titled “BitVM: Compute Anything on Bitcoin” by ZeroSync’s project lead Robin Linus, BitVM enables Turing-complete Bitcoin…
#bitcoin #zerosync #robinlinus #bitvm #ethereum #linus #taproot #merkletrees #dylanleclair #adamback
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The world of TV marketing is going through some striking changes. For years, advertisers have had celebrity talent as a backup plan for TV marketing campaigns, with press tours and public appearances being the secret sauce for successful rollouts. However, the Writers Guild of America and…
#sagaftra
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