1) Criticism continues to mount against the proposed ‘New Green Deal’, in particular the soaring cost it would entail. Although the plan has not been fleshed out enough to do accurate cost analysis, some objectives would need huge expenditures, just when the national debt has topped $22 trillion dollars, making the plan’s future doubtful. The recent massive failure of California’s high speed train and it’s cancellation is another stumbling block to the New Green Deal because it proposes a system of similar high speed trains to replace airliners.
2) The Ford Motor Company announced the recall of 1.5 million of their F150 pickups, which were manufactured from 2011 to 2013. Their six speed transmission has a software problem where it can suddenly down shift to first gear. This could cause loss of control and therefore crashes.
3) Fears are mounting over the $22 trillion dollar American public debt, which is mounting faster than the economy is growing, making it unsustainable. In addition to excess spending by the government, the growing numbers of ‘baby boomers’ retiring leaves not only increased spending obligations for the government, but less revenues coming in, while the younger people are making less monies and therefore paying in less thereby lowering revenues further.
4) 13 FEB 19 Stock market closings:
Dow 25,543.27 up 117.51
Nasdaq 7,420.38 up 5.76
S&P 500 2,753.03 up 8.30
10 Year Yield: up at 2.71%
Oil: up at $53.95