Donald Trump

Trump is Now the Enemy of Business

Please excuse the absence of The Dismal Optimist over the last few months. I have been on my back “meditating” while recovering from a full knee replacement. I don’t recommend the latter. I confess to having voted for Trump in 2016. Year one of Trump brought all kinds of business-friendly measures including a tax cut, […]

The Black Swan is Here – is it Trump?

The black swan theory is a metaphor that describes an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight. Old metaphor popularized by Nassim Nicholas Taleb For 10 months, China has been paying Tariffs to the USA of 25% on 50 Billion Dollars […]

Some Economic Common Sense

Those big tech companies [like Apple, Google etc.] often also work with governments…To trust one and not the other [Huawei], simply because one is Western and the other Chinese, is nothing but xenophobia and, dare I say, racist. Peter Kammerer, South China Morning Post Columnist As most observers have expected, the US and Chinese stock […]

Danger Ahead — The Export Controls Act Of 2018

The U.S. can believe it’s going to suppress [Chinese manufacturing] and take steps to suppress and contain it, but it’s preordained to fail. Parag Khanna, author of forthcoming book The Future Is Asian In the last Dismal Optimist, I took the cautiously optimistic view that Trump would need to make a deal with China in […]

Trump Needs a Deal with China

President Xi does not need to get elected. President Trump needs to get reelected. The stock markets will crash further if there is no trade deal with China and Trump will not get reelected. Therefore Trump must make a deal with China. It’s a syllogism. The forecast: Trump will make a deal. If there is […]

Damage American Technology Program

Fosun has a strategy to help everyone live until 121 years old: Technology Headline in South China Morning Post The 90 day “truce” agreed to in the G20 dinner between Presidents Trump and Xi is certainly a plus. The world has been spared, at least for the moment, an acceleration of a destructive trade war […]

Will Economic Sanity Prevail?

If there is a deal [with China], it will be on Trump’s terms, not on Wall Street’s terms…Trump has done an amazing job. He doesn’t need the help of Wall Street, he doesn’t need the help of Goldman Sachs. The mission of these unregistered foreign agents [Wall Street types like Hank Paulson], that’s what they […]

Last Week's Stock Market Crash – An Advance Warning

The premises of this war {over} the huge bilateral trade deficit with China are very peculiar. The presumption is that the U.S. is better and more efficient than any other country, and if we don’t export more than we import, China must be cheating. Any economist would say that premise is absurd. We live in […]

Taxes are Coming! Taxes are Coming!

Apple prices may increase because of the massive Tariffs we may be imposing on China—but there is an easy solution where there would be ZERO tax, and indeed a tax incentive. Make your products in the United States instead of China. Start building new plants now. Exciting! Tweet by US President Donald Trump President Trump, […]

American Constitution Trumped

Once upon a time Americans were very sensitive on the subject of taxation. They even dumped British tea into the Boston Harbor as a protest against British taxes. And the American constitution was written to give an elected Congress the primary power to impose taxes. But over the years, Congress has transferred its power to […]

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