🇨🇳❌🇪🇺 China hits back at the EU and bans the export of medical equipment to the European Union
This is a retaliatory measure taken by Beijing after the EU banned Chinese companies from purchasing European medical equipment
Chinese medical equipment are found in hospitals all across Europe and North America. Experts believe many if not all of them have "backdoors" integrated potentially allowing their Chinese manufacturer to reconfigure the apparatus or even turn it off.
Rare earth metals are essential in the manufacturing of medical equipment. China already has monopoly on the processing of such elements. Last April, the Chinese ministry of commerce imposed export restrictions on seven rare earth metals as a result of Trump's tariffs: samarium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, lutetium, scandium, and yttrium. These can be sold to foreign companies who have a special license registered with the Chinese state.
Samarium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, lutetium, scandium and yttrium are not just used in defense (key components in the manufacture of F-35 fighter jets, Virginia class submarines, radar systems etc.) but are essential materials in medicine.
Yttrium is used in the development of phosphors including red phosphors for LEDs and cathode ray tubes), electronic filters, electrolytes, electrodes, and superconductors.
Gadolinium and dysprosium are two key rare earth element used as a contrast agent in Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans. Their ability to enhance signal intensity helps doctors visualize tissues, organs, and blood vessels more clearly, particularly in detecting tumors.
Scandium-44 is a radioisotope that emits positrons, making it suitable for use in PET scans. PET imaging helps visualize metabolic processes in the body, allowing for the detection of diseases like cancer and heart disease.
Samarium, Terbium and Lutetium are used in cancer treatments being capable to destroy cancerous cells due to their radioactive nature, though each element is used for a particular type of cancer, Terbium being used to treat bone cancers, Lutetium being used to treat prostate cancer and Samarium is used as a painkiller and substitute for opioids in patients with late stage cancer.
China has the power to shut down hospitals in Europe and North America and leave thousands of Europeans and Americans without access to machines that can detect cancers and cancer treatments and the EU (and the U.S.) are trying to pick a fight with Beijing without developing a rare earth metal processing industry and alternative supply chains.
Donald Trump's trade war with China during his first term, which was fought over rare earth metals, showed itself how bad for the medical field is as China heavily restricted the export of rare earth metals in 2018. This will repeat with Europe instead of the U.S.
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Pedophile elites wanted to buy an Island, asked if it "comes with children".
Agent replied, the Island "does have a small school"
They don't know camera was rolling
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🇺🇸 #Oklahoma high school principal (Kirk Moore) seen charging at and disarming a school shooter.
The suspect, identified as 20-year-old Victor Hawkins, was a former student who said he wanted to shoot up the school “like the Columbine shooters did.” While taking down the shooter, Moore was shot in the leg. He is expected to recover.
When the Principal woke up that day, he never thought he would be tackling a gunman.
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Two months after the U.S. and Israel bombed Iran on February 28, the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for most tanker traffic, forcing more than 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude output shut-ins across the Middle Eastern oil producers.
The two-month-long closure of the Strait of Hormuz is longer than analysts had expected at the start of the war. Most assumed back then that the Strait would open by April and producers could restart shut-in wells in May.
Even if the Strait of Hormuz opened to free tanker traffic today, oil supply from the Middle East will take months to start flowing again and reach consumers in Asia, who were the first to feel the supply shock.
The longer the chokepoint remains off limits to most tanker traffic, the worse the scars would be on global supply and economic growth.
The restart of thousands of oil wells across the Middle East would be a big challenge. Some countries would need weeks, but others – like Iraq – many months to bring ...
🍚 War on Iran & El Niño threaten world rice production
Global rice supply is expected to decline this year as farmers across Asia reduce planting areas due to fertilizer shortages and higher fuel costs linked to the US-Israeli war on Iran, while an emerging El Niño weather pattern is also likely to further limit production of the world’s most widely consumed staple.
The impact of the war in West Asia is being felt by farmers in major exporting countries such as Thailand and Vietnam, as well as in import-dependent nations like the Philippines and Indonesia, according to growers and traders. Disruptions to fuel and fertilizer shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a key global shipping chokepoint linking the Gulf to international markets, have contributed to the strain.
Smallholder farmers in Southeast Asia are also facing added pressure as El Niño is expected to bring hotter and drier conditions in the second half of the year.
🔗 The Cradle
🛢 “Why aren’t oil prices higher?” “How can the oil market be so complacent?”
Oil prices almost always trade to extremes. Right before it does, it always gets “obvious” from a fundamental setup standpoint.
I remember a great conversation I had with Nelson Wu of Open Square Capital about the oil market being analogous to toilet paper. You don’t realize how badly you need it until you run out of it.
Oil prices trade on the margin. As long as there are onshore inventories to draw from, traders don’t panic. It’s when you run low on onshore inventories that panic starts to set in.
Goldman published an update on Thursday that basically captured the storage math phenomenon that we are seeing:
Global visible total oil inventories remain bloated relative to historical standards. If, for example, we had started the conflict with global oil inventories at the 2025 lows, WTI and Brent would already be above $200/bbl.
The ~1.4 billion bbl cushion at the start of 2026 is what gave the US ...