The Lead

Remember years ago when a group called "Occupy Wall Street" set up camp on........Wall Street........and were going to "democratize" the banking industry? Remember loan decisions were going to be made by committee by wiggling their hands either up or down for approval?

Speaking recently at a Senate Finance Committee hearing, Dr .Yellen commented; “I think many (cryptocurrencies) are used, at least in a transaction sense, mainly for illicit financing. And I think we really need to examine ways in which we can curtail their use, and make sure that anti-money laundering doesn't occur through those channels.” Now if you buy into that line of thinking you may be very surprised to know that the data just does not support Dr. Y's comments (and Daffy didn't win an Academy Award).

The roar of retail was amplified and crescendoed by emerging and established fintech long before it caught hedge fund managers in a short squeeze, according to a recent report from DriveWealth.

The most stunning display of misplaced culpability was witnessed on Wall Street last week. It began when a number of small investors, congregating in a Reddit chat group, started vigorously “crowdbuying” stock in public companies - most notably: GameStop ($GME) - which they believed were undervalued and possessed abnormally high and unjustifiable short interest ratios.

Bitcoin IS in the news and probably everyone knows roughly where the price is, too (the ones that don't probably DO know all Tom Brady's career statistics, though).

In the United States fintech wealth management space, it’s easy to forget about our neighbors to the north, but recent expansion in America among certain Canada-based firms are starting to get more attention.

Some use charts to predict price fluctuations. Some focus on fundamentals. Others use time machines built out of DeLoreans. Whatever mechanism you are using to forecast the price of bitcoin, make sure not to overlook the most basic analytic tool of all – psychology.

Never before in history has there been a viable replacement for gold but, alas, there is now. A young whippersnapper born of the digital age that answers to the name of Bitcoin may be putting old gold out to pasture.

Since we are basically still at the very beginning of 2021, with almost everyone making predictions for what may or may not happen in the coming year, it might be a good idea to look back. NOT at what happened but rather some very topical quotes and sayings that always seem to get overlooked (or ignored), BUT which have a direct and lasting importance on what's happening now. With some of these quotes, the government (and financial 'smarties') would rather you didn't remember them, but hey, they were the ones who said them.

The $5.3 billion deal between Visa and Plaid collapsed due to a government antitrust lawsuit. The U.S. Justice Department called Visa a "monopolist in online debit transactions."