The Chinese aircraft carrier Liaoning has sailed near the Japanese island of Okinawa and the US territory of Guam over the past two weeks. The naval operations came at the end of a year which saw several military escalations between Washington and Beijing.
Tokyo reported that the Liaoning and at least four other large warships operated in waters near Okinawa, adding that the ships remained about 150 miles offshore for several days. While in the area, the Chinese carrier conducted over 200 takeoff and landing drills.
On Thursday, Japanese officials confirmed that, after sailing away from Japan, the flotilla then traveled near the US territory of Guam. According to the Global Times, a Chinese newspaper closely linked with the country’s ruling Communist Party, the operation "showed that the Chinese carrier is ready to defend the country against potential US attacks launched from there."
The relationship between Washington and Beijing has continued to deteriorate in 2022, perhaps best exemplified by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan last summer and a massive round of Chinese military drills launched near the island in retaliation.
President Joe Biden has further fueled tensions by repeatedly asserting that US forces would come to Taiwan’s defense in the event of a Chinese invasion. However, Taiwan is not recognized as a sovereign nation under US law, which instead endorses Beijing’s claim to the island and calls for a position of "strategic ambiguity" towards Taipei.
While a number of past US administrations have refrained from openly saying whether Washington would intervene against China on Taiwan’s behalf, Biden has increasingly eroded that position, prompting senior White House officials to walk back his statements on multiple occasions. Proponents of strategic ambiguity contend that the policy acts as a deterrent against any future attack by Beijing, and stops short of emboldening Taipei to take aggressive actions of its own.
Biden recently met with Chinese President Xi on the sidelines of the G20 summit. While the goal was to seek to resolve various outstanding issues between the two powers, both countries continue to conduct provocative military exercises.
Tokyo – which is part a three-way security pact with Washington and Seoul created to confront Beijing – has also escalated regional tensions by announcing an end to its post-WWII defense-oriented military and plans to become the world’s third-highest weapons spender over the next five years. Moreover, the United States has worked to persuade its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to take part in its operations in Chinese-claimed waters, while Canada recently announced plans to conduct more military transits through the disputed Taiwan Strait.
Beijing has significantly deepened its security and diplomatic ties with Moscow this year, with the two allies striking a "no limits strategic partnership" in the days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in late February. The Asian superpowers have conducted joint drills in the waters and skies around both Japan and Taiwan in recent weeks, having just wrapped up naval exercises in the East China Sea on Tuesday. Another round of wargames on December 14 saw Chinese warships cross multiple Japanese straits as Russian fighters and bombers flew near Japanese airspace over the Sea of Japan.
Underscoring the rising hostilities, earlier this week the Pentagon released a video, captured on December 21, showing a Chinese fighter that approached an American spy plane over the South China Sea, accusing the pilot of performing an "unsafe maneuver" that risked a collision.
Laid-Off Silicon Valley Workers Panic Sell Start-Up Shares As Valuations Crash
Silicon Valley tech companies have benefited from over a decade of low-interest rates and easy money. But since the Federal Reserve turned off the liquidity taps to combat inflation -- at least for now -- tech firms have been forced into aggressive cost-cutting measures, such as reducing headcount.
This brings us to the workers who were fired this year. Financial Times reported, "employees of embattled tech groups are flooding secondary markets — where stakeholders in a private company sell shares to third parties." And as they unload shares on the private market, the valuations of these startups are collapsing.
"We are seeing an inflow of people being laid off trying to sell their shares," Greg Martin, managing director of Rainmaker Securities, which facilitates private stock transactions. "These companies have built their headcounts up so much, so there are a lot of people highly motivated to get a sale done," he said.
Martin added while there's an increasing number of laid-off workers trying to cash out, many of these sales are happening during valuation declines of "30-80% from a year ago."
A valuation reset for startups has led venture capitalists to sit on the sidelines and wait for the smoke to clear. The selling of private stock has also pushed down startup valuations.
FT published market valuations of private companies that show a rollercoaster ride in the last year.
The highly illiquid market for private secondary markets, such as those operated by Rainmaker, further complicates assessing valuations in times of market turmoil.
Data from Rainmaker showed that shares in Anduril, a defense artificial intelligence company backed by Peter Thiel's Founders Fund and Andreessen Horowitz valued at $8.5bn, traded at $16.95 per share in November, down from $31.50 in March. Brokers such as Rainmaker trade Anduril shares indirectly through special purpose vehicles, as Anduril prohibits direct trading of its shares on secondary markets.
Shares in SoftBank-backed Chime Bank, which was valued at $25bn when it last raised external capital in August 2021, have lost a quarter of their value since then on secondary markets, trading at $60 per share, according to the most recent data. --FT
Rainmaker's Martin warned there's a wave of laid-off employees who are dumping private stock into illiquid markets. The collapse in fundraising for the IPO market has complicated things for private companies, who are now scrambling to find lending lifelines.
On public markets, unprofitable tech companies have underperformed this year and are likely to continue doing so until the Fed pivots. Interest rate swaps suggest the Fed could begin cutting by late 2023.
The basket of money-losing tech companies compiled by Morgan Stanley has plunged 54% -- an epic roundtrip back to pre-Covid days.
Profitability has become necessary for investors in these challenging times. There may come a time when unprofitable companies outperform again, but that widely depends on Fed policy.
2022 was supposed to be the year crypto went mainstream, with a significant chunk of traditional venture capital firms betting heavily on the ecosystem in 2021. However, with one disaster after another, 2022 turned out to be a catastrophic year for the nascent crypto ecosystem. Some of the biggest names touted as pivotal to taking the crypto ecosystem forward turned out to be the orchestrators of its worst year in recent memory.
That said, quite a few protagonists rose to the occasion. These winners proved that crypto is not just about a few select individuals and companies but a vibrant ecosystem that can survive significant setbacks.
Let’s start with some of the biggest winners of the crypto ecosystem in 2022. The list includes individuals, companies and anonymous groups working for the betterment of the industry.
The winners
In a year that saw the multibillion-dollar collapses of the Terra ecosystem, FTX and Three Arrows Capital, it’s hard to pick winners. However, crypto has faced adversaries before, and 2022 was no different. Several positives came out of the year despite the collapse of several centralized entities.
Ledger and Trezor
When Satoshi Nakamoto created Bitcoin, a core idea was to give people financial sovereignty that made them less dependent on centralized intermediaries.
With offers of lucrative interest rates on yield products and derivatives trading services, most crypto users preferred to keep their crypto assets on centralized exchanges. However, these lucrative offerings become a nightmare when millions of customers lose their funds in the wake of a centralized exchange collapse.
In the rubble of the FTX collapse, crypto investors lost trust in centralized exchanges. Hardware wallet providers like Ledger and Trezor have benefitted from investors shifting their behavior toward self-custody.
In direct response to the failure of FTX, #Bitcoin investors, of all wallet cohorts, have made a distinct behavioural shift towards self-custody.
From Shrimp, to Whales, #Bitcoin onchain balances are on the rise🔵
By December, self-custody services and hardware wallets became the preferred choice of many. After the collapse of FTX, Trezor saw a 300% surge in sales and revenue and Ledger saw its biggest sale day ever.
White hat hackers
The crypto ecosystem is relatively new, and several use cases like decentralized finance (DeFi) are in early development. This makes it prone to bugs and exploits. According to DefiLlama, DeFi protocols were exploited for nearly $5.93 billion in 2022
Total value hacked (USD) from DeFi protocols in 2022. Source: DefiLlama
However, the figures would have been much higher if not for white hat hackers. These white hats returned millions of dollars in stolen funds and flagged security bugs that could have led to more exploits. Security service provider Immunefi claims to have prevented the theft of $20 billion worth of crypto assets alone through its bug bounty program for white hat hackers..
While many projects tend to ignore white hats, 2022 showed that it’s better to pay out millions in bug bounties than lose billions in exploits.
Tether
Amid the chaos of 2022, the Tether stablecoin has successfully manoeuvred its way through the wreckage of both the Terra and FTX collapses.
USDT price and volume on a 1-year chart. Source: CoinMarketCap
The centralized stablecoin has been at the forefront of critics’ commentary for as long as it has existed. When Terra’s native stablecoin depegged, there were rumors about Tether’s exposure to the doomed ecosystem.
Tether has become more transparent over time, with 82% of its reserves in liquid assets. The firm had total assets of $68.06 billion at the end of the third quarter, exceeding its total liabilities of $67.8 billion.
The losers
The crypto ecosystem saw many losers in 2022, with Sam Bankman-Fried the first to earn a mention. The former CEO of crypto exchange FTX started 2022 with a $20 billion net worth. In less than a year, that net worth disappeared and Bankman-Fried is now out on bail for allegedly stealing customers’ funds and committing securities fraud. Terra’s co-founder Do Kwon, whose last known location was Serbia, also makes the list.
TerraUSD
Algorithmic stablecoins were a novel, promising concept during the bull market. The Terra ecosystem rose to new highs based on this hype. However, the flawed design of TerraUSD (UST), now known as TerraClassicUSD (USTC), aided by the reckless decision-making of Kwon, led to its eventual downfall. The failure of Terra’s native stablecoin also tainted the concept of algorithmic stablecoins, with regulators warning against them.
The collapse of UST obliterated $40 billion of investor capital and caused a contagion that claimed nearly half a dozen other crypto firms with exposure to Terra. While many firms and individuals could qualify in the losers list, Terra’s UST implosion was the catalyst that precipitated more upheaval in 2022.
Alameda Research, FTX and centralized exchanges
At the start of 2022, FTX was valued at $32 billion, while its sister company Alameda Research boasted a several-billion-dollar valuation of its own. However, the November bank run on FTX soon turned into bankruptcy. As more details emerged, it turned out FTX and Alameda Research were not as independent as they claimed. Even FTX US, which was supposed to be a separate entity regulated under United States law, was found to be embroiled in the complex saga.
According to the authorities, FTX and Alameda funneled funds to each other, and the two firms were also involved in the embezzlement of customers’ funds. Alameda used FTX funds to loan billions of dollars to other firms. FTX, on the other hand, used nonexistent in-house projects with inflated valuations as collateral to take out significant loans. The whole Ponzi came crashing down in November.
The downfall of FTX and Alameda created more contagion in the crypto ecosystem and single-handedly erased trust in centralized exchanges and the broader crypto ecosystem practically overnight.
Crypto investors
Among all the chaos and downfall of many crypto exchanges and leading venture capital firms, the biggest losers are crypto investors. If the burn of the bear market was not enough, millions of crypto investors who had their funds on FTX lost their life savings overnight.
Terra was once a $40 billion ecosystem. Its native token, LUNA — now known as Terra Classic (LUNC) — was one of the top five biggest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. With millions of customers invested in the ecosystem, the collapse brought their investment to zero within hours. After the Terra collapse, crypto investors lost their funds on a series of centralized exchanges and staking platforms like Celsius, BlockFi and Hodlnaut. Crypto investors also lost significantly in the nonfungible token market, with the price of many popular collections down by 70%. Overall, crypto investors are among the biggest losers of the year.
2022 will go down in crypto history as an annus horribilis. Crypto investors will want to forget the year and start fresh. Venture capital firms and investors in crypto projects are reevaluating their investment strategies. After such a tumultuous year in crypto, a likely outcome will be the acceleration of regulations in the industry throughout the coming year. This may restore some of the lost confidence in the industry.
Russian Military Says Victory "Inevitable" In New Year Message
A New Year message issued by the Russian defense ministry declared that it sees victory in Ukraine as "inevitable" - even after the Russian ground forces' advance in the east in south has appeared stalled for months, and as aerial forces take aim at the national power grid across Ukrainian cities.
"In the coming year, I want to wish everyone good health, fortitude, reliable and devoted comrades... Our victory, like the New Year, is inevitable," Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in a Saturday video address soon before Russia rings in the new year.
The military campaign is now it its 11th month, and will reach one full year on Feb.24. Shoigu explained that 2022 included times that "we all faced serious trials" and that the New Year has come during a "difficult military-political situation."
"The outgoing year will forever enter the military chronicle of the Fatherland, filled with your immortal deeds, selfless courage and heroism in the fight against neo-Nazism and terrorism," Shoigu said.
"We will always remember our comrades who sacrificed themselves while performing combat missions in the name of saving civilians from genocide and violence only for the right to speak Russian," he added. In mentioning the "right to speak Russian" - he was referencing a crackdown on Russian culture and language, which has included recent moves to push forward new laws, by the Zelensky government which Moscow had complained about even before the war.
Two weeks ago, Russia admitted to just 5,937 military deaths in Ukraine, despite some Western estimates putting the figure as high as 100,000. Estimates of Ukrainian troop deaths are also difficult to assess accurately.
Recently, the US military said it estimates that some 200,000 have been killed on both sides. Citing the US Joint Chiefs chairman, a November report gave the following grim tally and breakdown:
The most senior US general estimates that around 100,000 Russian and 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or injured in the war in Ukraine.
Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, also suggested that around 40,000 civilians had died after being caught up in the conflict.
The estimates are the highest offered yet by a Western official.
This past week, the United Nations updated its numbers of civilian casualties over the course of the war since Feb.2022. An OHCHR press release cited a total number of 17,831 civilian casualties in Ukraine, including 6,884 killed and 10,947 injured.
For now the conflict remains essentially stalemated, with Russia exercising clear air superiority given it has of late been ramping up airstrikes against Ukraine's energy infrastructure - but with Ukraine forces receiving more and more powerful, longer-range weapons from the West. The US says Patriot anti-air missiles are en route, but these are expected to take six months minimum to go operational in the country.
Authorities in Pennsylvania arrested a suspect in the killings of four University of Idaho students who were found stabbed to death in their beds in November, authorities announced in a Friday news conference.
Bryan Christopher Kohberger, 28, was arrested early Friday morning by the Pennsylvania State Police at a home in Chestnuthill Township, authorities announced. He is being held for extradition to Idaho on a warrant for first degree murder, according to arrest paperwork filed in Monroe County Court.
Latah County prosecutor Bill Thompson confirmed in the Friday press conference that a criminal complaint was filed against Kohberger with four counts of murder and other charges in connection to the case. An affidavit has been sealed until Kohberger returns to Idaho to be served with a warrant, Thompson said.
The prosecutor said that Kohberger is being held without bond in Pennsylvania, also confirming earlier reports that he was a graduate student at Washington State University. In the news conference, few details were given about the suspect, including a possible motive.
“Once he gets here, he will have an initial appearance with a magistrate,” Thompson said.
Earlier Friday, a mugshot of Kohberger was released to various news outlets by the Monroe County Correctional Facility in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. Reports indicated that he was arrested near the Pocono Mountains in northeastern Pennsylvania
Kohberger graduated from Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania with an associate of arts degree in psychology in 2018, according to college spokesperson Mia Rossi-Marino. A Ph.D. student by the same name is listed in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Washington State University, which is a short drive across the state line from the University of Idaho.
DeSales University in Pennsylvania confirmed that a student by that name received a bachelor’s degree in 2020 and completed graduate studies in June 2022.
In a post that was deleted from Reddit after his arrest, a student associated with DeSales University named Bryan Kohberger sought participation in a project “to understand how emotions and psychological traits influence decision-making when committing a crime.”
“In particular, this study seeks to understand the story behind your most recent criminal offense, with an emphasis on your thoughts and feelings throughout your experience,” the post read.
Other Details
Four Idaho students identified as Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle, and Ethan Chapin were stabbed to death at a rental home near the campus sometime in the early morning of Nov. 13. Investigators were not able name a suspect or locate a murder weapon for several weeks, triggering widespread online speculation about a possible suspect and motive.
Here's A List Of Biden Tax Hikes Which Take Effect Jan. 1
When the Democrats finally passed the "Inflation Reduction Act" in 2022 (how's that going?), they included several tax hikes set to take effect on Jan. 1, 2023.
Americans for Tax reform's Mike Palicz has conveniently compiled a list of them, along with his take on their intended effects:
$6.5 Billion Natural Gas Tax Which Will Increase Household Energy Bills
Think your household energy bills are high now? Just wait until the three major energy taxes in the Inflation Reduction Act hit your wallet. The first is a regressive tax on American oil and gas development. The tax will drive up the cost of household energy bills. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the natural gas tax will increase taxes by $6.5 billion.
And of course, this tax hike violates Biden's pledge not to raise taxes on Americans making under $400,000 per year. According to the American Gas Association, the methane tax will slap a 17% increase on the average family's natural gas bill.
$12 Billion Crude Oil TaxWhich Will Increase Household Costs
Next up - a .16c/barrel tax on crude oil and imported petroleum products which will end up on the shoulders of consumers in the form of higher tax prices.
The tax hike violates President Biden’s tax pledge to any American making less than $400,000 per year.
As noted above, Biden administration officials have repeatedly admitted taxes that raise consumer energy prices are in violation of President Biden’s $400,000 tax pledge.
As if it weren’t bad enough, Democrats have pegged their oil tax increase to inflation. As inflation increases, so will the level of tax.
$1.2 Billion Coal Tax Which Will Increase Household Energy Bills
This one increases the current tax rate on coal from $0.50 to $1.10 per ton, while coal from surface mining would increase from $0.25 per to to $0.55 per ton, which will raise $1.2 billion per year in taxes that will undoubtedly be passed along to consumers in the form of higher energy bills.
$74 BillionStock Tax Which Will Hit Your Nest Egg — 401(k)s, IRAs and Pension Plans
Democrats are now imposing a new federal excise tax when Americans sell shares of a stock back to a company.
Raising taxes and restricting stock buybacks harms the retirement savings of any individual with a 401(k), IRA or pension plan.
Union retirement plans will also be hit.
The tax will put U.S. employers at a competitive disadvantage with China, which does not have such a tax.
Stock buybacks help grow retirement accounts. Raising taxes and restricting buybacks would harm the 58 percent of Americans who own stock and more than 60 million workers invested in a 401(k). An additional 14.83 million Americans are invested in 529 education savings accounts.
Retirement accounts hold the largest share of corporate stocks, accounting for roughly 37 percent of the outstanding $22.8 trillion in U.S. corporate stock, according to the Tax Foundation.
In 2017, corporate-sponsored funds made up $4.45 trillion in market value; union-sponsored funds accounted for $409 billion; and public-sponsored funds, which benefit teachers and police officers, added up to $4.25 trillion.
A tax on buybacks could dissuade companies from doing so, and US companies will face significant compliance costs, which will - again, be passed along to consumers.
$225 BillionCorporate Income Tax Hike Which Will Be Passed on to Households
American businesses reporting at least $1 billion in profits over the past three years will now face a 15% corporate alternative minimum tax, which will be passed along in the form of higher prices, fewer jobs and lower wages, according to Americans for Tax Reform.
A Tax Foundation report from last December found a 15 percent book tax would reduce GDP by 0.1 percent and kill 27,000 jobs.
Preliminary cost estimates from the Congressional Budget Office found the provision would increase taxes by more than $225 billion.
According to JCT’s analysis, 49.7 percent of the tax would be borne by the manufacturing industry at a time when manufacturers are already struggling with supply-chain disruptions.
Which industry will likely be most affected? According to the Tax Foundation, "the coal industry faces the heaviest burden of the book minimum tax, facing a net tax hike of 7.2 percent of its pretax book income, followed by automobile and truck manufacturing, which faces a 5.1 percent tax hike."
With state legislatures entering their third sessions since the 2020 pandemic pumped trillions in federal recovery and stimulus assistance into state and local government coffers, tax reform across a range of levies is among front-burner priorities for lawmakers in 2023.
During 2022 sessions, Washington, D.C.-based Tax Foundation reports at least 38 states adopted “noteworthy tax changes” with most going into effect on Jan. 1, including trims in personal income tax rates in 11 states and flat income tax structures being implemented in three states, Arizona, Idaho, and Mississippi on New Year’s Day.
Here is a round-up of “noteworthy tax changes” that go into effect Jan. 1 provided by analysts at the Tax Foundation, Council On State Taxation, and Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy:
* ARIZONA: A flat personal income tax rate of 2.5 percent will replace Arizona’s tiered, or progressive, income tax structure that had a top rate of 4.5 percent.
* IDAHO: Under 2022’s House Bill 1, Idaho will move to a flat personal income tax rate of 5.8 percent, replacing a progressive tax structure with a top assessment rate of 6 percent, on Jan. 3.
* INDIANA: Under 2022’s HB 1002, Indiana’s flat personal income tax rate will drop from 3.23 to 3.15 percent through 2024. Afterwards, the personal income tax rate will incrementally decline to 2.9 percent by 2029, depending on state revenues.
* IOWA: On Jan. 1, Iowa’s nine personal income tax rates will be consolidated into four, with the top declining from 8.53 to 6 percent. The state is set to implement a flat income tax rate of 3.9 percent in 2026.
Also beginning in 2023, Iowa will exempt retirement income, certain farm rental income, diapers, and menstrual products from taxation. The state will phase out its inheritance tax by 2025, with this levy also being incrementally slashed beginning in 2023.
On the other side of the ledger, Iowans will no longer be able to claim a state deduction on federal income and property taxes.
* KENTUCKY: Under 2022’s HB 8, Kentucky’s income taxes will go down, and some sales taxes will go up on Jan. 1.
The state’s flat personal income tax rate will dip from 5 to 4.5 percent in 2023 and to 4 percent in 2024. Depending on state revenues, state lawmakers plan to implement further incremental cuts until the personal income tax is eliminated.
The income tax cuts will be countered by new or increased sales taxes on a range of services, such as a 6 percent levy on limousine, car rental, ride-sharing, car-sharing, and taxicab services. A 1 percent transient room tax will now apply to campgrounds and RV parks.
Kentucky will also impose a new excise tax of 3 cents per kilowatt hour for electric vehicle power distributed in the state by an electric vehicle power dealer or by electric charging stations located on state property.
* MISSISSIPPI: Under 2022’s HB 531, Mississippi will adopt a flat personal income tax beginning Jan. 1. The state’s 4 percent levy on income between $5,000 and $10,000 will be eliminated and a 5 percent tax on income above $10,000 imposed.
Under the bill, the 5 percent flat rate will decrease to 4.7 percent in 2024, 4.4 percent in 2025, and 4 percent in 2026.
* MISSOURI: Under 2022’s Senate Bill 3, Missouri’s top personal income tax rate will be reduced from 5.3 to 4.95 percent, and the amount of income exempt from income taxation will increase from $100 to $1,000. The measure calls for incremental reductions in the top income rate levy to 4.5 percent.
Also on Jan. 1, Missouri will become the last state to assess state and local sales taxes on remote or online transactions under a 2021 bill.
* NEBRASKA: Under 2021 and 2022 bills, Nebraska will reduce its top personal income tax rate from 6.84 to 6.64 percent, and in its top corporate tax rate from 7.5 to 7.25 percent. The state will lower its top corporate income tax rate to 5.84 percent by 2027.
Also beginning in 2023, beneficiaries can deduct 60 percent of Social Security benefits, up from 40 percent in 2022, and exemptions from taxation for retirement and military pension incomes will be increased.
Property owners will also get some breaks in 2023 under 2022’s Nebraska Property Tax Incentive Act, which sets aside $660.7 million for income tax credits that will offset portions of school district and community college property taxes.
* NEW HAMPSHIRE: Under 2022’s HB 2, New Hampshire will start phasing out its income tax on interest and dividends income, lowering the levy from 5 to 4 percent on Jan. 1. The rate will decline by 1 percent until the tax is no more by 2027.
Under 2022’s HB. 1221, the state’s corporate income tax, or ‘Business Profits Tax,’ will drip from 7.6 to 7.5 percent beginning Jan. 1.
* NEW YORK: Under 2022’s SB 8009, New York will accelerate reductions in the state’s personal income tax rated for “middle-income earners” first adopted in 2016.
Beginning Jan. 1, the tax rate applied to income between $13,900 and $80,650 for single filers, and between $27,900 and $161,550 for joint filers, will be 5.5 percent, down from 5.85 percent. The tax rate on income between $80,650 and $215,400 for single filers, and between $161,500 and $323,200 for joint filers will decline from 6.25 percent to 6 percent.
Also beginning Jan. 1, New York will resume assessing its gas tax. The state’s 16 cents per gallon motor fuel tax had been suspended since June 1, 2022.
* NORTH CAROLINA: Under 2021’s SB 105, North Carolina’s flat personal income tax rate will decline from 4.99 to 4.75 percent on Jan. 1.
The rate is set to continue declining 3.99 percent by 2027, with North Carolina’s current 6.9 percent corporate income tax to disappear entirely by 2030.
Also beginning in 2023, the state’s franchise tax will be a simplified net worth levy instead of the three different franchise tax liability rates previously assessed.
* ALABAMA: Under 2022’s HB 162, Alabama will exempt the first $6,000 of retirement and military pension income for those 65 or older from income taxes beginning Jan. 1.
State lawmakers in 2022 also revised Alabama’s “business privilege tax,” reducing the minimum payment of $100 to $50 a year.
* DELAWARE: Under 2022’s SB 188, Delaware will increase its exemption from taxation on retirement and military pension income from $2,000 to $12,500 for those 60 and older beginning Jan. 1.
* RHODE ISLAND: Under 2022’s HB 7123, Rhode Island will boost its exemption on taxation on retirement and military pension income from $15,000 to $20,000 beginning Jan. 1.
* ILLINOIS: Under SB 157, Illinois’ Child Tax Credit will increase from 18 to 20 percent of the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) beginning Jan. 1.
On the other side of the ledger, the state’s gas tax inflation adjustment will be implemented on Jan. 1 following a six-month freeze. The state’s 42.3 cent tax on a gallon of gas will increase by 3.1 cents. Another inflation adjustment will be implemented in July.
* ARKANSAS: Under 2022’s HB 1002, reductions in personal and corporate income tax rates will be accelerated. Beginning Jan. 1, the top tax rate on personal income will dip from 5.5 to 4.9 percent, and the state’s corporate income tax rate will go down from 5.9 to 5.3 percent.
* PENNSYLVANIA: Under 2022’s HB 1342, Pennsylvania’s corporate income tax rate will be reduced from 9.99 percent to 8.99 percent on Jan. 1. The corporate tax rate will decline by a half-percent until it reaches 4.99 percent by 2031.
* OKLAHOMA: Under 2022’s HB 3418 in May 2022, Oklahoma will become the first state to make permanent a 100 percent bonus depreciation allowance for investments in machinery and equipment beginning Jan. 1.
The state will also require that local sales taxes be levied on retail sales of tangible personal property in 2023.
* VIRGINIA: Under several 2022 bills, Virginia will exempt groceries and essential hygiene products, including menstrual products, from the state’s 1.5 percent sales tax beginning Jan. 1.
Also, retired military pensioners 55 and older will be eligible to subtract up to $20,000 in military benefits from taxable income in 2023, up from $10,000. That exemption will increase to $30,000 in 2024 and $40,000 in 2025.
* KANSAS: Under 2022’s HB 2106, Kansas will begin phasing out its 6.5 percent sales tax on groceries to 4 percent on Jan. 1. The sales tax on groceries will decline to 2 percent in 2024 before disappearing in 2025.
* COLORADO: Under 2022’s HB 22-1055, Colorado will exempt diapers and menstrual products from sales taxes.
Sullivan To Visit Israel, Meet With Netanyahu, On Concerns Of Democratic Backsliding
On Thursday we took note of President Joe Biden's strained and slightly awkward congratulation message sent to newly sworn-in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his most hard-right wing and religious government in the nation's history.
In issuing the formal congratulations, Biden stressed that his administration will "oppose policies that endanger" the two-state solution or "contradict our mutual interests and values" - given Netanyahu's newly formed far-right government has vowed precisely to expand West Bank settlements, directly threatening the possibility of the kind of future two-state solution Washington says it's long sought.
On Friday it's been revealed the White House is planning to dispatch national security adviser Jake Sullivan to Israel after the start of the new year, in mid-January.
Israeli and US officials confirmed to Axios that Sullivan will hold talks with PM Netanyahu over his government's controversial policies, especially the most concerning ones which threaten to harm US-Israeli ties.
Listed among Sullivan and the White House's list of concerns is the potential for Israel's backsliding on democracy and human rights, given the new government plans to legalize Jewish outposts in the occupied West Bank.
U.S. concerns extend to policies that could harm Israeli democracy.
Those include measures that would decrease the independence of Israel's judicial system, and challenge the rights of its Arab minority and the LGBTQ+ communities.
What's more is that a visit by Secretary of State Antony Blinken could soon follow the Sullivan trip. While high-ranking US officials have frequently visited Israel across US administrations, and Israel continues receiving $3.3 billion annually in foreign military aid from America, the hardline make-up of the new government has apparently sent the White House scrambling.
Netanyahu has sworn in Israel’s most far right government ever… he’ll lead a coalition including figures once considered fringe extremists
Key line in its mission statement: promise to expand settlements in the Occupied West Bank where violence has already been flaring pic.twitter.com/Gpva0fc5ds
Other issues expected to be focus US-Israel intense dialogue in the coming months will likely be Iran and its nuclear program, as well as normalization efforts with Saudi Arabia.
Netanyahu is expected to get more hawkish on Iran, and could mull the possibility of preemptive strikes on the Islamic Republic's nuclear facilities. As for the Saudis, the new prime minister has been vocal of late in wanting to normalize relations, with the Trump era Abraham Accords serving as the foundation.
So…it turns out we crazy conspiracy theorists aren’t so crazy after all. In fact, we can knock “crazy” right off that moniker. Again. Elon Musk has allowed the curtain to be pulled back on Twitter to reveal corruption, collusion, and straight-up propaganda that have changed the course of American history. Musk is catching all sorts of flack for the Twitter Files from the mainstream media, who are somehow trying to defend the indefensible actions that have taken place behind the scenes and paint Musk as the bad guy for exposing it.
Many things that non-liberals have been saying for years have been shown to be true. There was indeed collusion between the Biden campaign and Twitter, conservatives were absolutely shadowbanned, the FBI is involved in social media, and points-of-view that were not in line with the narrative were suppressed by the social media giant.
What are the Twitter Files?
Elon Musk has provided journalists like Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, Lee Fang, and Michael Schellenberger access to years of internal documents and chat logs showing the trend of biased moderation behind the scenes. (You can sift through Musk’s own Twitter account to read these reveals yourself.
It’s a story of censorship cloaked as moderation and political bias cloaked as safety. Favors were done, and stories were either suppressed or allowed to trend based on the whims of a handful of people behind the scenes. Regardless of how many times the MSM says “alleged” in conjunction with these revelations, it’s very clear that there’s a real problem.
And keep in mind this is only the tip of the iceberg. I’d be willing to bet everything I have that similar conversations have gone on behind the scenes at Google and Facebook too. That means that Big Tech has been responsible for illicitly influencing the course of history, something we here at The Organic Prepper have been saying for a decade. While you personally may not have been influenced by things on social media, the people around you have been and the consensuses that were formed in America were based on biased information.
That’s a real problem. Propaganda works and the position our country is in shows the heinous aftermath of it.
Here’s what we learned from the Twitter Files so far.
The best synopsis I’ve seen of the Twitter Files comes from the account of journalist Benjamin Carlson. Carlson wrote, “No agency should be unaccountable. No institution is indispensable.”
What is the real story of the Twitter Files? It’s a much bigger deal than many realize.
I’ve spent hours reading the great reporting (now thousands of words in 7+ parts) by
@mtaibbi, @bariweiss, and @ShellenbergerMD
Here are 7 crucial takeaways everyone needs to know:
1. History changed because of this:
Hunter Biden’s alleged corruption censored
Covid 19 lockdown debate stifled
Trump silenced
You may agree with each decision. But there is no denying that halting information flow and free debate had real consequences.
2. Many things called conspiracy theories were true:
FBI was working w Twitter and paid TW $ millions
Blacklists & shadow bans were real
US intel lobbied to censor accounts
Covid-19 convo heavily manipulated
Twitter rules changed & enforced by whim
3. Censorship is being cloaked in the language of safety:
‘Safety, harm, violence’ redefined to apply to ideas
Opinions & info deemed ‘unsafe’ subject to silencing
Jokes, memes, questions about origin of covid off limits
4. The government is policing opinion:
FBI has 80 staff monitoring speech
Small accounts on left and right flagged
FBI held frequent meetings w TW
Facebook, Youtube, and Instagram = similar?
Private censors & police control what you say to whom.
5. Social media executives lie freely:
Twitter execs repeatedly and publicly denied shadow bans
In reality, bans were in place as “visibility filtering”
Ultimately, no accountability to public
6. Free speech is controlled by a small group:
Biggest decisions in Twitter Files made by 3-4 individuals
Despite misgivings and doubts, once made, decisions stuck
Now it’s Musk.
One difference: his embrace of public polls to set policy.
7. The slippery slope is real:
Staff rebellion led to Trump ban
Staff called for more covid-19 censorship
2021-22 saw increase of bans and ‘one-offs’
This is how you get Billy Baldwin in the crosshairs.
Once you silence a president, who has a right to speak?
8. Musk has made enemies:
Leaking to indy media
Expressing opinions on Fauci
Suspending journalist accounts
I expect his businesses will see counterattacks. Now is a good time to refocus—and let the users decide how to uphold free speech.
TLDR
History changed
Conspiracy theories true
‘Safety’ = censorship
Government policed ideas
Executives lied
Speech controlled by small group
Slippery slope is real
Musk must watch out
The MSM is outraged.
Unsurprisingly, those who have been shown to be biased and corrupt are displeased and the MSM is leaping to their defense and attacking Musk for using his platform to expose it.
Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk, is feverishly promoting his “Twitter Files”: selected internal communications from the company, laboriously tweeted out by sympathetic amanuenses. But Musk’s obvious conviction that he has released some partisan kraken is mistaken — far from conspiracy or systemic abuse, the files are a valuable peek behind the curtain of moderation at scale, hinting at the Sisyphean labors undertaken by every social media platform.
Vanity Fair dismisses the claims in the Twitter Files and focuses its wrath on Musk.
Right-wingers are reveling in the latest batch of Elon Musk’s Twitter Files, which Republicans continue to dubiously frame as bombshell revelations into the platform’s squelching of far-right accounts. But amid all the brouhaha, a simple question remains: What new information has actually emerged from these splashy document dumps?
…All that can be gleaned from the latest Twitter Files release is this: Musk, likely under pressure from spooked advertisers to justify his conservative rebrand of the company, wants everyone to know that at least a few right-wing users were sent to varying degrees of Twitter time-out.
The Intelligencer is equally dismissive and but far more sarcastic as they strive to discredit Musk.
..the Twitter Files are best understood as an egregious example of the very phenomenon it purports to condemn — that of social-media managers leveraging their platforms for partisan ends…
…The Constitution does not give you an inalienable right to retweet Hunter Biden’s genitals…
…The Twitter Files provide limited evidence that the social-media platform’s former management sometimes enforced its terms of service in inconsistent and politically biased ways. The project offers overwhelming evidence that Twitter’s current management is using the platform to promote tendentious, partisan narratives and conservative misinformation. In that sense, Taibbi and Weiss have performed revelatory journalism.
Musk’s conspiracy-baiting has quickly turned ugly, as he uses a project that purports to be about transparency to discredit Twitter’s former leadership and harass people he disagrees with. That’s giving his 120 million Twitter followers easy targets…
…many tech journalists, social media experts and former Twitter employees say Musk’s claims are over-hyped, given that the documents shared so far largely corroborate what is already known about the messy business of policing a large social network.
“What is really coming through in the Twitter Files for me is: people who are confronting high-stakes, unanticipated events and trying to figure out what policies apply and how,” said Renée DiResta, research manager at the Stanford Internet Observatory, who studies how narratives spread on social networks…
…But with his drumbeat of Twitter Files releases and gleeful tweets dunking on the company’s former employees, Musk has successfully hijacked the conversation.
“It is being processed as punitive and sort of owning the last regime, as opposed to saying, ‘Here are things that we can see in these files and here is how it’s going to be done differently under our watch,'” DiResta said.
I suppose the bottom line here is that when faced with one set of facts, people with different philosophies will always draw diverse and strongly held conclusions.
'I Also Orchestrated It': Uncharged J6 Witness Ray Epps Transcript Released
Ray Epps, the uncharged man identified as a key instigator behind the January 6, 2020 Capitol Breach for telling peopleto storm the Capitol, said in a text message to his nephew that he "orchestrated" things, according to newly released witness transcripts from the January 6th Committee.
On January 6, 2021 Ray Epps texted his nephew to say, “I WAS IN THE FRONT WITH A FEW OTHERS. I ALSO ORCHESTRATED IT.” See the relevant section and also link to full transcript below https://t.co/JV1cITkprdpic.twitter.com/EJb6UKoDfU
"At that point, I didn't know that they were breaking into the Capitol," Epps told Congressional investigators, adding "I didn't know anybody was in the Capitol. ... I was on my way back to the hotel room."
But the night before, Epps was seen going around to various groups of Trump supporters, telling them they need to storm the capitol.
Ray Epps was near the front line from the very beginning of the riot when he was whispering in Ryan Samsel's ear to when he helped push a large metal sign into the police line (for which others have been charged with felonies)
In two interviews with the FBI in 2021, Epps explained his actions on Jan. 5 and Jan. 6. He admitted he was guiltyof trespassing on restricted Capitol grounds and confessed to urging protesters to go to—and into—the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Epps also told members of the Committee that he found himself playing peacekeeper between Trump supporter "Baked Alaska" and the police - who called Epps a Fed.
"I was trying to find some common ground," said Epps. "This guy was trying to turn people against me...he was calling me 'boomer,' and it's his generation's fault that we're in the position we're in."
Despite the admissions, the FBI never arrested Epps and he was not charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with any Jan. 6 crimes. The non-action has fueled a crop of theories that he might have been working for the FBI or another agency.
Epps, 61, has repeatedly denied those suggestions through his attorney.
Speculation that Epps was a 'fed' intensified after a Revolver News reported with the headline: "Meet Ray Epps: The Fed-Protected Provocateur Who Appears To Have Led The Very First 1/6 Attack On The U.S. Capitol"
Revolver also determined, and will prove below, that the the FBI stealthily removed Ray Epps from its Capitol Violence Most Wanted List on July 1, just one day after Revolver exposed the inexplicable and puzzlesome FBI protection of known Epps associate and Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes. July 1 was also just one day after separate New York Times report amplified a glaring, falsifiable lie about Epps’s role in the events of January 6.
Lastly, Ray Epps appears to have worked alongside several individuals — many of them suspiciously unindicted — to carry out a breach of the police barricades that induced a subsequent flood of unsuspecting MAGA protesters to unwittingly trespass on Capitol restricted grounds and place themselves in legal jeopardy. -Revolver News
As speculation over Epps grew, Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) claimed that Epps had "cooperated with the Jan 6 committee," and was removed from the FBI's most wanted list "because apparently he broke no laws."
US Mulls Testing Airline Wastewater As China Covid Surge Expands
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is considering a plan to sample wastewater taken from international aircraft to track emerging Covid-19 variants, Reuters reports.
According to an infectious disease expert, such a policy would provide the best chance of tracking the virus and slowing its entry into the United States, vs. blanket travel restrictions announced this week by the US and other countries, which once again are requiring mandatory negative Covid tests for travelers from China.
"They seem to be essential from a political standpoint. I think each government feels like they will be accused of not doing enough to protect their citizens if they don’t do these," said Dr. Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert at the University of Minnesota, referring to the travel restrictions.
Nearly half of a plane-load of 212 passengers who arrived in Italy's Milan Airport from China on Monday tested positive for Covid, according to a Wednesday statement by a regional health chief.
This week the United States added its voluntary genomic sequencing program to the Seattle and Los Angeles airports, bringing to the total number of airports that can analyze positive tests to seven.
That may not be enough, according to experts.
A better solution would be testing wastewater from airlines, which would offer a clearer picture of how the virus is mutating, given China’s lack of data transparency, said Dr Eric Topol, a genomics expert and director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla, California.
Getting wastewater off planes from China “would be a very good tactic,” Topol said, adding that it’s important that the United States upgrade its surveillance tactics “because of China being so unwilling to share its genomic data.” -CNBC
China has hit back at critics, calling criticism of its Covid statistics 'groundless' - and saying that the risk of new variants is low, as they would likely be more infectious but less severe.
According to CDC spokeswoman Kristen Nordlund, sampling airline wastewater is one of several options the agency is considering.
"Previous Covid-19 wastewater surveillance has shown to be a valuable tool and airplane wastewater surveillance could potentially be an option," she wrote.
In July, French researchers reported that airplane wastewater tests revealed that negative Covid tests don't protect against new variants - finding the Omicron strain in wastewater from two commercial airplanes which flew from Ethopia to France in Dec. 2021 despite all passengers having tested negative.
California researchers reported in July that sampling of community wastewater in San Diego detected the presence of the alpha, delta, epsilon and omicron variants up to 14 days before they started showing up on nasal swabs.
Osterholm and others said mandatory testing before travel to the United States is unlikely to keep new variants out of the country. -CNBC
"Border closures or border testing really makes very little difference. Maybe it slows it down by a few days," said Osterholm, adding that the virus is likely to spread worldwide anyway, so closing borders would simply delay the inevitable.
During its 2023 Davos conference, the World Economic Forum will host a press conference on its “Building The Metaverse Initiative,” and release key “studies” and details about its efforts to further facilitate what appears to amount to a global surveillance network, according to documents reviewed by The Dossier.
The Metaverse, a buzzworthy bumper sticker slogan that refers to a whole host of ideas in the technology space, has potential current and future applications both for private and governmental entities. It will be featured as one of the core staples of the 2023 Davos conference.
What is the Metaverse, exactly?
The term Metaverse was invented by author Neal Stephenson in his 1992 sci-fi novel Snow Crash, in which citizens used digital avatars as a means to escape their dystopian reality.
Today it can bedefinedas “a vision of what many in the computer industry believe is the next iteration of the internet: a single, shared, immersive, persistent, 3D virtual space where humans experience life in ways they could not in the physical world.” Before its expanded definition, the Metaverse encompassed a technologically advancing virtual and augmented reality space.
To entrepreneurs and technology companies, this computer world can serve as a potential revenue and data harvesting stream. For the committed forces of technocratic tyranny, the Metaverse can act as a global surveillance network that can keep tabs on anyone with an internet connection. A Metaverse-adopting society can make it much easier for ruling governments to track the movement, behaviors, and activities of its citizens.
For the World Economic Forum, the narrative and ideas shop of the ruling class, the latter applications are more aligned with their feudalistic ambitions.
The WEF is the chief coalition builder for what amounts to the modern depopulation movement. Over the years, they've partnered with Big Tech, central bankers, governmental, and international organizations to facilitate their feudalistic vision for the future, which involves deliberately rolling back human progress, innovation, and flourishing, under the guise of saving the planet from a “climate emergency.” While various WEF “partners” have different motives for joining the ruling class alliance, they all have an incentive to cater to the WEF’s most prized climate hoax narratives.
The WEF Metaverse press conference event description reads:
“This press conference will announce the first, and long-awaited, outputs of the Defining and Building the Metaverse Initiative: highly anticipated briefing papers on Interoperability in the Metaverse from the governance track of the project, and Demystifying the Consumer Metaverse from the value creation track. These two briefing papers, the first in each workstream’s series, will serve as the foremost publications involving this amount of research, this number of stakeholders from diverse industries (120+ partners are involved in this initiative), into these topics.”
The WEF will also host an event at Davos 2023 titled “Deployment In The Industrial Metaverse.” Panelists will discuss how “the next era of the internet is fast approaching in the form of the metaverse, an immersive, interoperable and synchronous digital world.”
“In the industrial metaverse, unique opportunities will arise from the convergence of artificial intelligence, digital twins, data and robotic technologies,” the readout continues.
The Dossier reviewed a list of the listed partners to the World Economic Forum’s Metaverse Initiative. They include corporate actors like Meta (formerly known as Facebook), Microsoft, Walmart, and Sony. Notably, the list includes major financial services and banking enterprises, such as Mastercard, Deutsche Bank, J.P. Morgan, and Lloyds.
Things really take a dark turn when moving down to the state and global governance partners to the WEF’s Metaverse Initiative. These partners include Interpol, the United Nations counter terrorism office, the U.S. NIH’s National Human Genome Research Institute, and several additional countries’ information and communication ministries.
The WEF looks to the Chinese Communist Party as themodel nationfor proper governance. The CCP’s nationwide surveillance regime, through its “Great Firewall” and other components, could very well become the standard for Metaverse governance.
JUST IN - Klaus Schwab's WEF: "The internet will eventually evolve into the metaverse, which will come to represent the next major computing platform."
These people are so far removed from reality it’s scary.
In May, WEF founder Klaus Schwab addressed his organization’s Metaverse work. Schwab reveals a lot about his intentions in his framing of the term,stating:
“The metaverse will influence the way, people, governments, companies and society at large think, work, interact and communicate for the purpose of collectively addressing issues on the global agenda.”
