Free Republic

Stocks sank on Wednesday as a steep decline in tech shares and worries of rapidly rising rates sent Wall Street on pace for its worst day in six months. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded more than 600 points lower as Intel and Microsoft fell more than 2.5 percent each. The Nasdaq Composite plummeted 3 percent. The S&P 500 dropped 2.5 percent, with the tech sector underperforming. The broad index was also headed for a five-day losing streak — which would be its longest since late 2016 — and fell below its 50-day moving average, a widely followed technical level....

President Trump will have a choice opportunity that few if any presidents have had — the immediate chance to fill two openings on the board of governors of the Federal Reserve. Only five of the board’s seven seats are now filled, a fact that has received scant attention in the press. Yet finding the right nominees will be important in setting the stage for monetary reforms needed to end the age of fiat money and put paid to the “false economy” of which Mr. Trump warned. We are only one stop on the organ known as the “Great Mentioner,” but...

A widely watched measure of future economic activity fell for its third consecutive month in September because of rising energy costs that may slow the nation's economy through year-end, a private research group said Thursday. (snip) Energy prices had been steadily climbing prior to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, but the storms aggravated shortages and propelled prices higher. This hurt consumer spending and also made certain raw goods more expensive for manufacturers. [today the price of gasoline, on futures market, is near $1.60, oil is near 60 instead of 70 and natural gas has dropped 2.00 in two weeks. Winter may...