At last!

Australia from global example for ban on social media for young teens to pariah for Bondi beach massacre in a few days. Welcome to the future

Opinion: Big tech's spending spree marks the end of an era. The best of them were magical creatures: a group of companies where investors didn't have to think about the balance sheets at all. That's over now, and in recent weeks, the stock markets have started to notice. on.ft.com/3WWmwwI

In the second column of a 2-part series, Dirk Niepelt discusses recent developments in stablecoins, tokenisation, and decentralised finance, and details multiple ideas to address emerging risks while preserving the benefits offered by the rapidly evolving landscape. cepr.org/voxeu/column... #EconSky

In the first of two VoxEU columns accompanying the new CEPR #eBook, editor Dirk Niepelt highlights major trends of digitalisation across the world, including new payments systems in India and Brazil and approaches by advanced economies in the US and euro area. cepr.org/voxeu/column... #EconSky

Don't miss the next UAM Research Seminar! 📅 Tomorrow at 1 PM – Research Seminar @uam.es 🎙️ Speaker: @mgeiras.bsky.social (@unibo.it) 📘 Title: Why Might the Old Want to Honor Sovereign Debt? #UAMResearchSeminars #Economics #Madrid sites.google.com/view/researc...

Unprecedented excluding the guillotine, no?

Almost everybody expects a devaluation in ten days, after midterm elections. Even Bessent. Not a bet to win money but one to win power

👏

What cycle?

For ten years, since Frey and Obsbone’s buzz about job automation, I have been saying that I would start worrying when a robot that sorts Lego’s bricks is mass produced. That day seems closer now

Anthony Lane closing his piece on “Faustus” with a 1938 anecdote from the US Congress: “Christopher Marlowe has been every kind of dangerous since the sixteenth century, and to find that he’s a Communist, too, would be one more feather in his cap. Hell, why not?” 👏 www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

🚨🚨 Pre-doc Hiring! 🚨🚨 We are hiring pre-docs to start in Princeton in Summer 2026, supporting Pascaline Dupas, @thomasfujiwara.bsky.social @seema.bsky.social and Mica Sviatschi. This is a great opportunity to gain experience in development economics research before applying to PhD programs. Link 👇

Israel is a rogue state attacking beyond its borders with impunity and practicing genocide on Palestines. Please boicot and condemn, even if it feels like David against Goliath www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

“from my chaise, for free.” 👏

People that worry about global warming do not pay to “offset” their CO2 emissions for the same reason that in times of fiscal consolidation they may support spending cuts as long as these do not affect their “entitlements”

AI will generate tears of sadness if a crash wipes your savings. Or tears of joy if you make the effort to understand (at textbook level) transformers

Israel is a rogue state, exhibit 665 www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

Norway to review $2tn oil fund’s investments in Israeli companies on.ft.com/45lwRWC

Further evidence that not all AI is evil www.theguardian.com/music/2025/j...

Between this, Nato spending free ride attempt, and rampant corruption in his inner circle, president Sanchez ought to step down

More interesting to see who ends up benefiting from such a plan

Andrés Oppenheimer y los recortes a la ciencia en EEUU. Se anticiparán repatriaciones (a Europa en particular). Aparte de ello, cuántos científicos emigrarán? www.lanacion.com.ar/opinion/la-o...

Repeat until you have no doubt: Putin bad, Netanyahu good

If you have been criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and now feel a mild discomfort supporting Israel and USA’s bombing of Iran (or the slaughter in Gaza) don’t worry. It is just a symptom of “cognitive dissonance”, or trying to sustain two contradictory beliefs. If no discomfort, low IQ

Iran should say it accepts US proposal if Israel withdraws from every territory they illegally occupy and pay for the rebuilding of Gaza. That would be a nice move

Imminent conviction of former Argentine president Cristina Kirchner on corruption charges. I expect protests and riots to far exceed those in LA

From experience, in Denmark things work very well when inside a “corridor of normality”. Apparently the same applies to the youth’s experience of democracy www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Beware your words. With such a headline one can conclude at least one mystery solved: Trump must be God www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Nada de los “actores (para)estatales” que buscan “crear la creciente polarización política”?

ALERTA - AHORA: horas después de que revelamos en @LANACION que la SIDE puso en la mira a periodistas y economistas, entre otros, hackers han intentado tomar el control de mis cuentas de WhatsApp (10 intentos) y de X (1 intento). Por ahora no lo han logrado. Por favor, RT.

Puppet Musk “It was a trial balloon on how they would reduce federal employees. If it worked and people thought it was great, maybe they would keep going… but they used [Musk] as the front person for it and the punching bag. When it backfired, they cut him loose” www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Instead I want Israel next year in Eurovision and out of Gaza and other territories it illegally occupies www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Why did Argentina EMBI spread increase this week despite Miley’s party winning local election in Buenos Aires? Probably because they used an AI fake video of former president Macri saying he was backing the government’s candidate just before election. Markets recoil from signs of institutional decay

Pedro Sánchez seems to have the inertia that Spain’s renewal energy generators lack

I found this video by MIT Professor Andrej Karpathy really worth the time (3½ hours). A non-technical walkthrough on creating an LLM chatbot like ChatGPT. youtu.be/7xTGNNLPyMI?...

Impossible mission (or very improbable)

In COVID terms, that Trump might not understand, about 1.2 million deaths

I self-medicate but good to know the physician agrees www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...

This is a reminder that you can oppose 1) antisemitism, 2) the Gaza genocide, 3) the October 7 attacks, and 4) the current assault on universities, at the same time, and with no contradiction.

Two Democrats on US antitrust panel say they were ‘illegally fired’ by Donald Trump https://www.ft.com/content/de157878-23a6-4961-8f30-60566d7b0d44

Danny's last surprise. I had long considered myself in favor of Swiss-style assisted suicide laws, but this story stirred up all sorts of contrary, complicated feelings.

Belleza de nota de Carlos Manfroni: “Si a este título le quitáramos la coma…” www.lanacion.com.ar/opinion/escr...

Memecoin scandal rocks Argentina’s Javier Milei https://www.ft.com/content/27bcc19e-d422-4fac-ac08-5b76c1095e52

¿No le llamó la atención a Milei, economista que la ve y candidato al premio Nobel, que el lanzamiento de $LIBRA fuera un viernes luego que cerraran los mercados y siendo hoy lunes feriado en EEUU? Nota en el blog hoy economiaposible.wordpress.com/2025/02/17/l...

Durante los últimos meses, el presidente Javier Milei se reunió a solas con cuatro de los "empresarios" detrás de $LIBRA, y trabajó desde 2020 para al menos uno de ellos, que le pagó honorarios por sus charlas como "capacitador gold": www.lanacion.com.ar/politica/est...

Viva la corrupción carajo!

What should be expected if, as was the case, some recipients of aid grew since 1960. If anything this news should be celebrated

Small piece on MIT Technology Review I read last week. Semiconductors are off the cliff but my take is that the “DeepSeek” effect will most strongly impact cloud AI services (mentioned at the end of article)