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Tag: weak

  • ‘Really weak option’: Wall Street sours on DeSantis as Trump challenger

    ‘Really weak option’: Wall Street sours on DeSantis as Trump challenger

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    “People will change horses,” said Dave Carney, a veteran Republican strategist for both former Bush presidents. “You may get really excited about somebody and then all of a sudden realize, ‘Eh, not really my cup of tea.’”

    Where Wall Street puts its money matters because financial industry executives are among the biggest donors in presidential elections. And while bankers and asset managers generally favor lower taxes and lighter-touch regulation, they also value stability and experience — and they spread their money around to candidates of both parties, meaning they’re very much in play in each cycle.

    On paper, that should give DeSantis an advantage. People close to Wall Street donors said his national profile and powerhouse fundraising operation that has included support from hedge fund titans like Ken Griffin and Jeff Yass had positioned him as most able to survive a primary with former President Donald Trump.

    DeSantis’ gubernatorial reelection campaign is still loaded with cash, giving him big advantages over possible competitors. But many now say he no longer seems so formidable — at least on Wall Street.

    His escalation of a feud with the Walt Disney Co. over its opposition to what critics called the “don’t say gay” law has made for a rocky rollout to an expected presidential campaign announcement in the coming weeks. On April 26, the company announced it was suing DeSantis, saying he violated its First Amendment rights — which will force him to do battle with one of his state’s largest employers in federal court.

    It was “‘wait and see,’ and this is why,” said an adviser to one top GOP donor in New York, who like others interviewed for this story was granted anonymity to avoid alienating candidates. “We’re not the only ones who are happy with our decision to wait and see.”

    With Trump surging in the polls following his indictment on criminal charges stemming from alleged hush money payments, one executive at a New York bank said confidence in DeSantis’s ability to win is flagging.

    “DeSantis is certainly a better option than Trump at this point,” the executive said. “But he’s a really weak option.”

    The executive said many are growing resigned to the possibility of a general election rematch between Trump and President Joe Biden.

    “What we probably wind up with is a choice between a guy who is very old and wants to raise our taxes and reregulate everything, and a guy who could be running from prison,” the executive said.

    In the meantime, any hesitation about DeSantis’s viability could be good news for Republicans who have tried to carve out space as business-friendly alternatives to Trump. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and Sen. Tim Scott — another South Carolina Republican who has launched an exploratory committee — have started lining their war chests with checks from major investors, according to campaign filings released in April.

    During the first quarter, Haley raised about $8.3 million across her campaign, joint fundraising committee and leadership PAC. Scott, the ranking member on the Senate Banking Committee, raised $1.6 million and had $21.9 million on hand through his Senate committee, according to POLITICO’s analysis of his FEC filings. Those funds can easily be transferred to a presidential committee should he formally announce.

    Scott is a fixture in New York, turning up for meetings at various big banks, and is beginning to draw backers at firms like Goldman Sachs. Bankers say they appreciate both his personal narrative — rising from humble beginnings — and his positive message about the power of American capitalism.

    Still, Scott and Haley’s fundraising totals remain modest compared to those of DeSantis-aligned groups — one state-level committee, Friends of Ron DeSantis, has more than $85 million on hand.

    For many Republicans on Wall Street, “there’s a lot of concern about whether Trump will consolidate support in the polls,” said Ken Spain, a partner at Narrative Strategies who advises investment firms. “Then the concern becomes: Does that freeze money in the investor class? Do people sit on the sidelines if they think the chance of defeating Trump in a primary is diminishing?”

    Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), who leads the House Financial Services Committee, said in an interview at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills this week that the Trump campaign’s tactics over the next two months will be “well-organized, calculated, surgical.”

    “This reminds me a lot of ’16 where everybody’s trying to figure out alternatives to Trump,” he said.

    Those dynamics won’t make things any easier for DeSantis, who’s been catching flak over everything from the Disney fracas — a “self-inflicted wound,” one financial industry power broker said — to his arms-length relationship with key donors and GOP allies in Florida.

    “I call my donors. I call my supporters. And that’s been an issue that people have complained about with him,” said Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, a Republican who has flirted with a 2024 bid.

    But Scott, Haley, former Vice President Mike Pence and other potential GOP nominees face their own challenges. While DeSantis has shown he can win big in a swing state, other nominees have won in Republican strongholds. Many also lack national name recognition that would put them within striking distance of Trump or DeSantis.

    “Scott is pretty fantastic, and if he can perform the way I think he can he has a real chance,” said one senior banker who is trying to organize support for him. “But it’s obviously a big hill to climb.”

    DeSantis allies are taking comfort in the difficulties other candidates could have in breaking through. While there’s “some hesitancy from the Wall Street Journal class,” the Florida governor’s resources should be enough to sustain any surge from non-Trump competitors, said Jason Thomas, a Republican strategist who runs a pro-DeSantis Super PAC.

    Even though DeSantis has shown a willingness to wage public battles against big businesses — hardly typical of what Thomas labeled a Country Club Republican platform — Thomas said he expects financial services donors to “eventually come home when DeSantis recaptures his first-place position in the nomination process or is the nominee.”

    The first executive at the large New York bank said Wall Street would love a candidate like former House Speaker Paul Ryan “or a younger Mitt Romney.”

    But they acknowledged that Trump would likely obliterate any candidate from the increasingly small centrist segment of the GOP.

    “We all saw what happened to Jeb Bush, who everybody up here loved,” the executive said of Wall Street donors who flocked to the former Florida governor’s 2016 campaign. “He got crushed and crushed quickly, and that would just happen again.”

    DeSantis could face another problem even if he does win substantial financial industry backing: Executives say they worry that raising money or donating to his campaign would give Trump the chance to brandish him as a Wall Street lackey.

    “We know everyone hates us and that nobody running for president wants to be seen as the ‘Wall Street candidate,’” the first executive said. “So you’ll probably see a lot of people just sitting this one out.”

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    #weak #option #Wall #Street #sours #DeSantis #Trump #challenger
    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • US economy grew at weak 1.1% rate in Q1 in sign of slowdown

    US economy grew at weak 1.1% rate in Q1 in sign of slowdown

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    The housing market, which is especially vulnerable to higher loan rates, has been battered. Consumer spending, which fuels roughly 70% of the entire economy, has softened. And many banks have tightened their lending standards since the failure last month of two major U.S. banks, making it even harder to borrow to buy a house or a car or to expand a business.

    Many economists say the cumulative impact of the Fed’s rate hikes has yet to be fully felt. Yet the central bank’s policymakers are aiming for a so-called soft landing: Cooling growth enough to curb inflation yet not so much as to send the world’s largest economy tumbling into a recession.

    There is widespread skepticism that the Fed will succeed. An economic model used by the Conference Board, a business research group, puts the probability of a U.S. recession over the next year at 99%.

    The Conference Board’s recession-probability gauge had hung around zero from September 2020, as the economy rebounded explosively from the COVID-19 recession, until March 2022, when the Fed started raising rates to fight inflation.

    Consumers, whose spending accounts for roughly 70% of U.S. economic output, seem to be starting to feel the chill. Retail sales had enjoyed a strong start in January, aided by warmer-than-expected weather and bigger Social Security checks. But in February and again in March, retail sales tumbled.

    The worst fears of a 2008-style financial crisis have eased over the past month. But lingering credit cutbacks, which were mentioned in the Fed’s survey this month of regional economies, is likely to hobble growth.

    Political risks are growing, too. Congressional Republicans are threatening to let the federal government default on its debts, by refusing to raise the statutory limit on what it can borrow, if Democrats and President Joe Biden fail to agree to spending restrictions and cuts. A first-ever default on the federal debt would shatter the market for U.S. Treasurys — the world’s biggest — and possibly cause a global financial crisis.

    The global backdrop is also looking bleaker. The International Monetary Fund this month downgraded its forecast for worldwide economic growth, citing rising interest rates around the world, financial uncertainty and chronic inflation. American exporters could suffer as a consequence.

    Still, the U.S. economy has surprised before. Recession fears rose early last year after GDP had shrunk for two straight quarters. But the economy roared back in the second half of 2022, powered by surprisingly sturdy consumer spending.

    A strong job market has given Americans the confidence and financial wherewithal to keep shopping: 2021 and 2022 were the two best years for job creation on record. And hiring has remained strong so far this year, though it has decelerated from January to February and then to March.

    The jobs report for April, which the government will issue on May 5, is expected to show that employers added a decent but still-lower total of 185,000 jobs this month, according to a survey of forecasters by FactSet.

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    #economy #grew #weak #rate #sign #slowdown
    ( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

  • Biden isn’t going into 2024 very strong. But Republicans are very weak | Moira Donegan

    Biden isn’t going into 2024 very strong. But Republicans are very weak | Moira Donegan

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    It’s not surprising, but now it’s official: Joe Biden is running for re-election. In a video on Tuesday launching his bid for a second term, Biden cast his administration as standing for personal freedom, democracy and pluralism in contrast to what he called “Maga extremists”. The video emphasized abortion rights and contrasted Biden and the Democrats with unsettling images of the Capitol insurrectionists. Echoing a repeated line from his most recent State of the Union address, the president implored Americans: “Let’s finish the job.”

    There will be no primary. True, Biden has disaffected some members of the Democratic party’s precariously large coalition, and he has failed to capture the hearts and imaginations of Americans the way that, say, Barack Obama did. In 2020, a basketball team’s worth of Democrats entered the presidential primary – partly out of perceptions of then president Trump’s weakness, but also partly because Biden seemed like such a poor fit to be the party’s standard-bearer.

    He’s an old white man in a party that is predominantly female, increasingly non-white and very young. He is a moderate in a party with a resurgent left. And he is a bone-deep believer in the merits of compromise and bipartisanship, in an era where the Republican party has become anathema to cooperation, hostile to Democratic governance and committed to racial and gender hierarchies that are not worth compromising with. He seemed like a man out of time, responding to the political conditions of a different era; it was unclear, then, that he could see the country as it really was, unclear that he could confront the true threat.

    As he announces his re-election campaign, four years after he threw his hat into the ring for 2020, Biden has quieted these fears, if not disproved them. The left, leaderless after Bernie Sanders’s defeat in the 2020 primary, has not formed a cohesive bloc, and their pressures on the Biden administration have been noble but sporadic. Congressional Republicans hamstrung most of Biden’s agenda, causing him to abandon, in particular, promises he made to help Americans get affordable childcare; but he still managed to pass a large infrastructure bill, as well as Covid relief.

    The pandemic has largely receded, and both deaths and new infections are down. Inflation is slowing, and jobs numbers are encouraging. The economy, while not perfect, seems to be benefiting from the stability of Democratic leadership, with stock prices no longer beholden to wild fluctuations in the aftermath of an errant comment or impulsive tweet from Trump.

    When Russia invaded Ukraine, unleashing horrific humanitarian catastrophes on the people there and endangering other European allies, a trap was laid that could have easily drawn the United States into war. Biden and his administration have deftly kept us out of it. The president who once seemed like an out-of-touch old man has been successfully rebranded as an affable grandfather whose gaffes are thoughtless but aggressively well-meaning.

    Even major missteps do not seem to have meaningfully injured Biden. The administration was shockingly tone-deaf and ill-prepared following the US supreme court’s decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, having little in the way of policy proposals to reduce the humanitarian and dignity harms imposed on American women – and at one point, trying to appoint an anti-choice judge to a lifetime seat, before withdrawing the nomination under pressure.

    Despite the primacy Tuesday’s campaign announcement gave abortion rights, Biden has generally seemed uncomfortable and incompetent on the issue, even as women face degradation and medical emergencies inflicted at the hands of conservative states; he has largely shied away from directly addressing abortion, and shunted it off to his unpopular, largely powerless vice-president, Kamala Harris – whose own marginalization within the administration is a signal of how little he values the issue.

    Even since Dobbs, Biden has been entirely unwilling to confront the federal judiciary – a captured and unaccountable extremist rightwing body that will foil his whole agenda, and gradually eliminate both pluralist society and representative democracy, if it is not reformed. Yet the Republicans’ virulent misogyny and bald sadism on abortion seems poised to be a boon to Democrats anyway: it was mostly abortion that drove voters to give a worse-than-expected showing to Republicans in the 2022 midterms, and to allow Democrats to keep control of the Senate.

    In that sense, the political fallout of the Dobbs decision may serve as a good model for the Democrats’ emerging 2024 strategy: they don’t need to be especially good, because the Republicans are so cruelly and chaotically worse. The Republican party is in shambles – internally divided; married to gruesome and unpopular policies, particularly on gender, that alienate voters; branded as violent, antisocial and creepy. There’s still a long way to go, but the Republican party seems only slightly less eager to anoint Trump as their nominee than the Democrats have been to appoint Biden.

    It very well may wind up being a rematch of the 2020 election – only now, Trump is even weaker, even more marginal, even more disliked, linked forever the memory of the January 6 violence and devoid of what was once his novelty and comedy and reduced to a rambling catalogue of personal grievances. With an opponent like that, it might not matter much if all that Biden has to offer is a series of charming anachronisms, or grinning photo ops in his aviators.

    All the Republicans have to offer is sex obsession and cheesy fraud, parading a series of candidates for state and federal office who talk like a collection of snake-oil salesmen and gun fetishists. Biden isn’t going into 2024 particularly strong. But right now, the Republicans are particularly weak.

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    #Biden #isnt #strong #Republicans #weak #Moira #Donegan
    ( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )

  • PM’s repeated visits show how weak BJP is in Karnataka: Congress

    PM’s repeated visits show how weak BJP is in Karnataka: Congress

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    Congress high command will decide on who will be the CM: Shivakumar

    Bengaluru: The Congress claimed on Saturday that the repeated visits of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the southern state only show how weak the BJP is in Karnataka, which goes to the polls on May 10.

    Speaking to mediapersons, Karnataka Congress President D.K. Shivakumar said that the people of the state have taken a decision to overthrow the BJP government, which is known to the saffron party leaders and that is why the central leaders of the BJP are repeatedly visiting the state.

    “Narendra Modi is the Prime Minister of the country, and he can come down to the state as many times as he wishes. But he is repeatedly visiting Karnataka now for campaigning, which shows how weak the BJP is in the state,” Shivakumar said.

    MS Education Academy

    “By making all these attempts, the BJP leaders seem to have already conceded defeat. The voters of the state are intelligent and they are going to change the government, no matter who visits the state,” he added.

    The Congress leader also claimed that since they are not able to draw the masses, the BJP leaders are roping in film actors.

    “There is a conspiracy to use the Enforcement Directorate (ED) against the Congress candidates. The police are also acting as BJP’s agents. I have asked to prepare a list of such officers. They can do this for only 40 days,” Shivakumar said.

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    #PMs #repeated #visits #show #weak #BJP #Karnataka #Congress

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

  • Markets fall in initial trade on weak global trends

    Markets fall in initial trade on weak global trends

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    Mumbai: Stock market benchmark indices fell in initial trade on Wednesday tracking weak global trends ahead of the release of minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting.

    The BSE Sensex fell 329.12 points to 60,343.60 after a weak beginning. The NSE Nifty declined 97.3 points to 17,729.40.

    From the Sensex pack, IndusInd Bank, Wipro, UltraTech Cement, Power Grid, Bajaj Finserv, HCL Technologies, Tata Motors, Infosys, NTPC and Bajaj Finance were the major laggards.

    Maruti and Larsen & Toubro were the winners.

    In Asian markets, South Korea, Japan, China and Hong Kong were trading lower.

    The US markets had ended significantly lower on Tuesday.

    “US stocks tumbled led by growing concerns that the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates higher for longer,” said Mitul Shah, Head of Research Institutional Desk, Reliance Securities Ltd.

    The BSE benchmark had edged down 18.82 points or 0.03 per cent to settle at 60,672.72 on Tuesday. The Nifty slipped 17.90 points or 0.1 per cent to end at 17,826.70.

    International oil benchmark Brent crude declined 1.21 per cent to USD 83.01 per barrel.

    “The US macro data continues to dictate equity markets globally. The US markets reacted sharply negatively to the series of economic data indicating that the process of disinflation is slow and, therefore, the Fed will have to continue raising rates longer than expected earlier.

    “This pushed up the 10-year bond yield sharply to 3.95 per cent and stocks fell sharply. These negative US equity market trends are impacting equity markets everywhere and India cannot be an exception to this trend at least in the near-term,” said V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

    Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) bought shares worth Rs 525.80 crore on Tuesday, according to exchange data.

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    #Markets #fall #initial #trade #weak #global #trends

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

  • Shocking images emerge of weak Iranian prisoner on hunger strike

    Shocking images emerge of weak Iranian prisoner on hunger strike

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    Images of a jailed Iranian doctor and human rights activist have circulated on social media platforms after he declared a hunger strike in support of the ongoing anti-hijab protests since the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody.

    53-year-old Farhad Meysami, who has been imprisoned since 2018 for supporting activists who rejected the policy of imposing the headscarf.

    The activist was charged with spreading propaganda against the Islamic Republic, gathering and colluding to commit crimes against national security, and insulting sanctities.

    Farhad began his hunger strike on October 7, 2022, in protest of the government’s crackdown on protesters.

    In images, which spread on social media, sparked outrage and warnings that he was in danger of death. 

    His lawyer wrote on Twitter that he had lost 52 kilograms of weight as a result of the hunger strike.

    “My client Farhad Meysami’s life is in danger He has started a hunger strike to protest the recent killings in the streets and government killings. According to the announcement of the prison health department, his weight has decreased to 52 kilos and he has been beaten due to his resistance to being transferred to the prison for dangerous prisoners,” tweeted lawyer Mohammad Moghimi. “

    In a letter published by the BBC Persian service, Meysami announced three demands— an end to executions, the release of political and civilian prisoners, and an end to forced headscarf harassment.

    Amnesty International called on the Iranian authorities to release Meysami without conditions.

    “Harrowing photos of Dr Farhad Meysami, a brave hunger-striking advocate for women’s rights, in prison,” Robert Malley, the US special envoy for Iran, wrote on Twitter.

    Tweeters posted a video showing the doctor before his arrest, and he appeared to be in good health.

    Protests in Iran continues

    Iran has been witnessing protests since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, on September 16, after she was arrested in Tehran by the morality police on suspicion of not respecting the country’s dress code.

    The demonstrations involved people from all walks of life and different sects in Iran after Amini’s killing.

    Iranian women are at the fore in the demonstrations, in which many young people participate, to chants of “Woman life freedom” and “Death to the dictator.”

    The protests represent one of the country’s boldest challenges since the 1979 revolution.

    Despite the widespread condemnation of the suppression of the popular protests in Iran, the torrent of arrests carried out by the Iranian regime, its issuance of harsh sentences against protestors, and reports of hunger strikes and torture of prisoners in separate parts of the country, continues.

    The regime continued to pressure other demonstrators and activists of the popular uprising through arrests, harsh sentences, and bans.

    The Human Rights Activists News Agency (Hrana) announced that 527 protesters had been killed in the unrest as of Saturday, February 4, including 71 children.

    At least 19,623 people, including 718 students, were arrested in those protests that took place in 164 cities and towns and 144 universities.



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    #Shocking #images #emerge #weak #Iranian #prisoner #hunger #strike

    ( With inputs from www.siasat.com )