As tools for measuring the links between #weather patterns & economic output evolve — & the interactions between weather & the #economy magnify the costs in unpredictable ways — the damage estimates have only risen.
It’s the kind of data that one might expect to set off alarm bells across the #financial industry, which closely tracks economic developments that might affect portfolios of #stocks & #loans. But it was hard to detect even a ripple.
>160k student loan borrowers are now in line to have their balances canceled, bringing the total amount of #DebtForgiveness allowed under the Biden admin’s policies to $167B, the #Education Dept announced Wed.
With the #election months away, #POTUS#Biden is lauding his admin’s achievements in delivering loan cancellation to nearly 4.8M people through a mix of existing programs & new policies. #Republicans have remained staunchly opposed to the effort, decrying it as a waste of taxpayers’ money & patently unfair to Americans who never went to college.
“I promised to fight to ensure higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity,” #Biden said in a stmnt Wed. “I will never stop working to cancel student debt — no matter how many times Republican elected ofcls try to stop us.”
Dude. You had $3,000 in student loans. Some of "these kids" graduated from college $70,000 in debt for the same degree you got, now they're earning half as much (post-inflation) as you did for a comparable job and they have no expectation of any retirement benefits, and they've been paying on that loan for fifteen years and owe more on it now than they did when they started paying it. They are being ruthlessly exploited by student loan management companies whose entire business model is based upon gouging people who are struggling to pay off their student loans.
Would it fucking KILL YOU to show a little compassion and understanding?
Trump stands to gain billions… from the merger between TrumpMedia & Tech & the blank-check co [#SPAC] #DWAC, which took the parent company of #TruthSocial public.
But #TrumpMedia almost didn’t make it to the merger after #regulators opened a #securities investigation into it in 2021 & caused the co to burn through cash at an extraordinary rate as it waited…for its IPO.
The situation led TrumpMedia to take emergency #loans, incl’g from an entity called #ESFamilyTrust, which opened an acct w/ #PaxumBank, a small bank registered on the #Caribbean island of #Dominica best known for providing #financial services to the #porn industry.
The new details are drawn from docs incl’g: #PaxumBank recs showing #Postolnikov having access to the trust’s acct, papers that created the trust showing as its settlor a lawyer in St Petersburg, #Russia, & 3 yrs of its #financial transactions.
The concern surrounding the #loans to #Trump Media is that #ESFamilyTrust may have been used to complete a transaction that Paxum itself could not.
Paxum DOES NOT OFFER LOANS in the #US as it lacks a US #BANKING#LICENSE & is not regulated by the #FDIC.
The #ESFamilyTrust was funded for the first time on 2 Dec 2021.
#TrumpMedia then received the #loans:
$2m on 23 Dec 2021, & $6m on 17 Feb 2022.
The loans came in the form of convertible promissory notes, meaning ESFamilyTrust would gain a major stake in #Trump Media because it was offering the #money in exchange for TrumpMedia agreeing to convert the loan principal into “shares of Company Stock”.
"The World Bank has approved a loan of US$750 million (RM3.54 billion) to Colombia, to help the country become more resilient in the face of climate change by buoying up renewable energy efforts and reducing carbon emissions, the bank said yesterday."
That follows a December 2022 loan of US$1 billion.
Articles like this make the lender look good but almost never disclose the terms. Is it aid, or is it rent seeking?
"Wealthy nations have loaned at least $18 billion at market-rate interest. That is not the norm for #loans for climate-related and other aid projects, which usually carry low or no #interest.
At least another $11 billion in loans – nearly all from Japan – required recipient nations to hire or purchase materials from companies in the lending countries. Conditional aid can carry additional costs because recipients can’t consider cheaper contractors."
The danger posed to #Trump’s #finances by 2 recent judgments against him has been, if anything, underappreciated. The size of the awards, the structure of his business empire, & the condition of the #RealEstate#market combine to create a truly perilous moment for #TrumpOrganization &, by extension, for Trump’s personal finances.
If this was true at the time, which is doubtful, it is not true now. On Feb 28, he asked an appellate court to reduce the #bond amount in the #fraud case to $100M, & said he might have to #sell properties otherwise. The court declined to lower the bond, but did temporarily stay the ruling by the trial judge, Arthur #Engoron, that #Trump couldn’t seek #loans from #banks.
Such existing #loans likely include covenants that prevent owners from subordinating them to other liens—which would effectively reduce how much #Trump can use the properties as collateral, says Jim Wheaton, a #law prof at William&Mary who has studied Trump’s #finances. In simple terms, if a building is worth $50M, & $30M of that is subject to another #loan, the covenant means the other $20M isn’t free & clear to use as #collateral.
The ruling allows #Trump to seek #loans elsewhere, but he has exhausted nearly every traditional ave…. #Deutsche, now notorious for its sloppy practices, was his “lender of last resort,”…but the NYAG’s lawsuit revealed the #bank ended its relationship w/him. That makes it unclear who else might be willing to make a loan to Trump—but one possibility is a wealthy individual, #foreign or domestic, might see making a large loan to a potential future #POTUS as a way to exert #influence over him.