Sunday, November 20, 2022
Enron..
Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers is likening the collapse of troubled cryptocurrency exchange FTX to the meltdown that engulfed Houston-based energy company Enron two decades ago.
The swift collapse of FTX was underscored on Friday by the company’s announcement that it had begun Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings in a Delaware court and that its chief executive, Sam Bankman-Fried, had resigned. John J. Ray III, the lawyer who was brought in to clean up the mess left at Enron, was appointed to succeed Bankman-Fried. The announcement rattled the cryptocurrencies sector, where the price of Bitcoin BTCUSD touched a two-year low after FTX’s announcement.
“A lot of people have compared this to Lehman. I would compare it to Enron,” Summers reportedly said.
Enron is the once high-flying energy trading company that collapsed in late 2001 amid accusations of accounting fraud.
Hunt--er..?
House Republican poised to investigate the Biden family said he's not planning to subpoena President Joe Biden despite being prepared to issue one to his son, Hunter.
"There's no plans to subpoena Joe Biden. There are plans to subpoena Hunter Biden," GOP Rep. Jim Comer told CNN in a sit-down interview.
The acknowledgment by Comer, the likely next chairman of the House Oversight Committee, that subpoenaing a sitting president unleashes a host of thorny executive privilege issues underscores the complicated task ahead for Republicans as they claim they will try to connect Hunter Biden's foreign business dealings to his father.
Comment: No wonder President Biden kept saying he is defending Democracy. He is not concerned about Democracy; he may have a different concern.
Just a thought.
Liz..
In 2014, Elizabeth Holmes, then 30 years old, a Stanford University drop-out, founded a company valued at $9bn (£6.5bn) for supposedly bringing about a revolution in diagnosing disease.
With a few drops of blood, its Edison test could detect cancer and diabetes quickly without the hassle of needles. Bigwigs from Henry Kissinger to general James Mattis sat on the board.
But by 2015, the seams were coming apart, and within a year, Holmes was exposed as a fake. She had a time to switch to the real diagnosis.
During the trial Holmes accused her ex-boyfriend and business partner, Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani, of emotional and sexual abuse at the time of the alleged crimes, impairing her mental state. She was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
Just a thought.
Saturday, November 19, 2022
Colossal..
US has been named the “colossal fossil” of the Cop27 climate talks by campaigners who criticised the country for its intransigence in providing support to developing countries hit hardest by the climate crisis.