Author: Money Mechanics

This Week In A Nutshell: Mortgage-rate volatility has moderated as the United States and Iran near a peace agreement, but succession drama at the Federal Reserve may amp up uncertainty once again as Fed chair nominee Kevin Warsh has his confirmation hearing. Upcoming Attractions   Retail sales data for March will be released on Tuesday. While it provides a key window into the financial health of consumers and is expected to strengthen marginally, the series is noisy and unlikely to move markets much. As usual for the past seven weeks, markets will be most sensitive to the outcome of the…

After 15 years, Tim Cook will hand off the Apple CEO role to John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Starting on September 1, Ternus will lead one of the world’s most valuable companies, but if you’re not a dedicated Apple enthusiast, you’ve probably never heard of this man, who has largely remained out of the spotlight until now. How long has John Ternus worked at Apple? Ternus has worked at Apple for nearly half of his life — now 51 years old, he has been with the company for 25 years. He joined Apple’s product design…

(Oil & Gas 360) By Greg Barnett, MBA – Iran’s economy is absorbing a fast‑widening financial shock as the combined impact of the Strait of Hormuz blockade and Red Sea disruptions sharply constrains oil exports, trade flows, and access to hard currency. Analysts tracking sanctions enforcement and maritime traffic estimate the immediate economic damage at roughly $435 million per day, with some projections pushing losses closer to $480 million daily once secondary effects are included. The loss strikes at the most vulnerable point in Iran’s economic structure. Oil and gas generate the overwhelming share of foreign exchange earnings, fund a substantial…

Full disclosure: I am a DeFi user with active exposure to Aave V3, including lent stablecoins and ETH. This is an opinion piece on how I withdrew, why I decided to pull all of it, and what I am watching now. This is not financial advice in any way. Do your own research, talk to a professional, and never act on a single article, including this one. I spent most of Sunday morning, April 19, doing two things, refreshing DefiLlama and waiting for transactions to confirm. By the time I got coffee, Aave had lost roughly $6.6 billion in deposits…

Coming off a remarkable 2025, which saw the registration of new collateralized insurer class of companies in Bermuda climb to its highest level ever, early indicators for Q1 2026 suggest a continuation of this growth trend with seven new special purpose insurers (SPIs) and two new collateralized insurers having registered in Bermuda during the opening quarter.The latest data available from the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) shows that company structures for use in insurance-linked securities arrangements, as well as other alternative or third-party reinsurance capital related use-cases, remains very strong in 2026. As we previously reported, in full-year 2025, the number…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the worldCitadel’s head of commodities has said Donald Trump’s social media posts during the Iran war have transformed how oil markets behave, leaving traders struggling to adjust to the volatility sparked by the US president’s frequent messages.Sebastian Barrack, who has helped build Ken Griffin’s hedge fund into one of the world’s most influential energy traders, told the FT Commodities Global Summit that he had a screen solely to monitor the president’s social media posts.The early days of the Middle East conflict…

Who’s straight is it anyway? It’s open, it’s closed, its madness! The Strait of Hormuz is still in flux, as ships had to get flushed out after Iran again proved they cannot be trusted. Iran fired on ships in the Strait of Hormuz after Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi— the Iranian official who stated, “In line with the ceasefire in Lebanon, the passage for all commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz is declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire on the coordinated route as already announced by the Ports and Maritime Organization of the Islamic Republic of…

So far, the gasoline price shock in Canada has not been as bad as what happened after the pandemic, but I am not incredibly optimistic about the medium-term outlook. The above figure is the national average cost for unleaded gasoline (at self-service stations if you want to get even more specific), but the data ends in March, so it is missing the price rise since then. In my neck of the woods in the Greater Montreal Area, the pump price has been around $2 per litre, although Montreal is normally higher than the national average series shown above.The Carney government…

Surfshark and Kerry Wan/ZDNETFollow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.ZDNET’s key takeawaysSurfshark has launched a new VPN protocol that promises better security and barrier-breaking speeds.Instead of sharing a tunnel with other user traffic, Dausos provides each user with their own tunnel.Initial tests reveal promise, but it isn’t quite there, yet, in terms of performance compared to WireGuard. Surfshark has unveiled Dausos, a new virtual private network (VPN) protocol designed to improve consumer-grade VPN speeds and security.What is Dausos?Named after the Lithuanian word for heaven and as a nod to ascendence, Dausos is Surfshark’s proprietary VPN protocol, which the company hopes will set…

(Oil & Gas 360) By Michael Smolinski – Our Predictions: Strait Of Hormuz Safely Open In 3-4 Weeks, We’ve Seen Retail Oil Price Highs, Much Higher Natural Gas Prices Will Follow April Lows.      Operation Epic Fury jumped retail oil prices to burdensome highs.  Responses to Operation Epic Fury include the Weekly California No. 2 Diesel retail price jumping up to $7.567 per gallon two weeks ago (Figure 1, bold line) and the West Coast retail gasoline price to $5.396 (red line).  The California diesel price high is $1.699 (29%) more than its Russian invasion high.  The West Coast…