with these moral consult lawyers inspectors do some more digging and what they reveal brings us to act two some of the precious metal in colossus coffers could be blood gold shuffling through papers auditor's discover the refinery was more than happy to shake hands with small mining operations in sudan and the democratic republic of congo apparently colossi asked for no licenses offering cash in hand in exchange for gold proceeds from search sales and conflict torn countries are known to directly fuel gang wars which are responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths soldiers naam group leaders see in control of the gold mines as a way to money guns and power for forty two of the ruthlessly often targeting civilians in the process so ernst and young employees calm through colossus cash transactions that's when we get to act three apparently the company deals in cash almost as much as in conventional bank transfers that's billions of dollars go into a legal black hole impossible to trace so the auditor's diligently record every

failure of the dubai giant but there's no pattern the bad for them from the boss we requested a meeting with the babies to get it or when they realized that the law going to alter our findings or change them they went ahead and. changed their own guidelines in such a way that our findings and or for their conclusions will not be made public ernst and young have denied allegations they were in cahoots with the group the dubai refinery is still in business saying there's been no material impact on their ability to operate or trade i'm just rehired the man who led the team and expose the alleged wrongdoings says the audit ing giant branded him a troublemaker and sacked him so is blowing the whistle a noble thing or just a falls here and in this saga it's left up to the court you've done of ours.

now the luxury swiss resort of divorces is opening its doors to the participants of the annual world economic forum but going through the guest list you might think this year is more about politics than the economy because a record number of g seven leaders are expected to attend and that includes the u.s. president and jacqueline booga reports many were shocked from the start that mr america first would even consider attending a summit whose tagline is creating a shared future in a fractured world but of course according to most reports don't trump has no plans of catering to the globalist atmosphere that the former both and one third once again use the chance to push forward his own brand of economic nationalism donald trump would be the first president since bill clinton back in two thousand to attend the conference but it's unclear how warm of a welcome he should be expecting protests have already been seen in switzerland and more expected throughout the week as his visit looms near and in addition to that an online petition has garnered almost seven hundred thousand signatures asking the

president to just stay home. the record number of world leaders is not the only difference at this year's forum the issues being discussed will move away from economics and touch on race privilege and religious issues author and editor gerald flinty thinks that those participating at davos focused on urgent economic needs the davos big to the zero point one percent of the people they have very little concern about or what the rest of the people are getting it's one big club and it's to deal making club again all this other little things about you know gay rights equal pay oh that's just a lot of nonsense and it's for the media to write about when they don't want to write about the hard facts of how the so few own so much of how so many own so little. well with all those v.i.p. guests descending on divorce this january so has something tourists usually hope

for when heading to switzerland snow am plenty of it too because in just a couple of days around two metres of snow fall covered the whole resort and it's left the community there with a real struggle on its hands to local authorities are concerned about the possibility of avalanches saying that they may even attempt an artificially triggered avalanche to downgrade the recess. to the u.s. now where the three day government shutdown has finally come to an end after the president signed a bill but the mainstream media is still focusing on the failures of donald trump however most reports do ignore the shutdown was actually two weeks shorter than the one suffered under the previous administration. should have been a day of celebration for president one year in office the one year anniversary of his presidency but the party he planned at mar a lago is no more at the moment because you're waking up to

a government that is shut down this is hard stuff for him this is his first anniversary tomorrow he's got a big party and then he's going out to show the world what a great job he's doing as president scepticism domestic crisis if he was such a great deal maker the government wouldn't be closed today well after three days it looks like a bill has now been signed into law that will keep the u.s. government once again up and running donald trump has gone ahead and signed the bill that will bring the u.s. federal government into motion once again for at least two weeks as negotiations continue regarding the dhaka immigration debate in the lead up to the voting we heard in both the house and the u.s. senate we heard democrats and republicans blaming each other for the shutdown and now we also want to further illustrate exactly what it means that the u.s. federal government is being shut down.

america knows this is that from shutdown. so let's get that nice little ring to it doesn't it senate democrats shut down this government a big fat failure. causing us international still to come for you this morning britain's military chief has highlighted the country's biggest threat and says that the u.k. lack of funding does leave it comparatively we will have a look at that in more detail just after the break.

when you. see. what. they. said. you know. that. you speak french.

again russia has been described as the biggest state based threat to the u.k. since the cold war chief of general staff nick carr said wants more funding to you he says to bridge the gap between british and russian capabilities with more details. the arch exponent of this is russia i believe represents the most complex and capable state based threat to our country since the end of the cold war i believe or ability to preempt or respond to these threats will be eroded if we don't match up to them now we cannot afford to sit back on

military chiefs asking for more money for new equipment is pretty standard practice but normally it's retired generals this time around you had the acting head of the army nick carter so risking annoying his paymasters really by saying that he needs more money for the military but the purpose of the speech was just that he was warning of the dangers of underinvestment in the u.k. his defense forces and he spoke of the dangers of failing to keep up with the level of russia's military spending and also with what he called russia's our north of dogs and hybrid warfare and one thing that was certainly unorthodox in his speech was this ordeal clip take a listen no indication of the scale of them organization is clear from a three minute video clip i'm now going to show you this was run on russian t.v. a couple of years ago you don't need to understand the russian just the sense of

the tone of the commentary the uses the movie music going to use the just get you the goods that we use live you need to use the movie it was playing on stereotypes of what sort of russian sounds like the russian language and his perception that russia may be aggressive and hell bent on world domination nick carter wasn't the first person to talk about the threat coming from russia to resume a spoke about the same thing in a big foreign policy speech late last year it is also worth pointing out that when they're not asking for more money you cave military chiefs are somewhat more blunt as a about the whole russia thing it's a very different tone. last summer then defense secretary michael fallon he joked that russia is probably jealous about bush's new state of the art aircraft carrier because russia's is so dated and you've also got boris johnson the u.k.'s

foreign secretary meeting with his u.s. counterpart here in the u.k. rex tillerson talking about iran north korea and syria they haven't mentioned russia being on the agenda. security analyst charles she bridge does believe there is some truth to deter to the general speech saying the u.k. is armed forces are underfunded there is something of course to what the general actually says and that is that first of all. the british state of the british military in terms of the number of its personnel the number the amount of its equipment and according to that quitman is at a pitifully low level and so therefore you have to have some sympathy perhaps for this man if you forgive me if i'm wrong but it's about money it's not just russia of course we're talking about north korea or iran or the other bogeyman that are used for this notwithstanding that i mean it's very interesting that we hear that the russian threat today is actually not thousands of miles away but on the

doorstep of europe actually did reason for that is because russia has moved it's because nato of course has moved much much closer over the last twenty years towards the borders of russia so it's a slightly ironic thing to say i think. finally this hour does turn out that a north korean pop star who was thought to have been executed is now going to lead her country's delegation the upcoming winter olympics and it's not the first time either there has been confusion over the well being of high profile figures from that part of the world.

and that's how i things looking so far today here on our table back with more of the top the.

oil. here year ago better because one nine hundred the proud parents said this was their year toys to go to all kinds of crazy eyes and yeah it sure. our experiencing a bit of a fall back. exists is harlan kentucky. you. know we've always moved them voices people we're going street families or you know you're. a co money city it was almost no coal mines left. the jobs are gone all the coal mines the said. that it was a laugh to see these people the survivors of disappearing before their eyes.

i remember thinking when i was younger that if anything ever happened to the coal mines here that it would become a ghost town but i never thought in a million years i would see that and it's happened it's happened. oh. oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh. oh. oh

this is boom bust broadcasting around the world from washington d.c. i'm bart chilton. coming up we'll take stock of equities get it sorry probably too soon we move fast around here we'll take stock of equities n f well listen of stocks to do an analysis of some key companies and analyze their performance plus holland cook of the big picture tells us why baby boomers. might be the most money consequential generation out there and we go to miami for the north american bit of a bit coin conference and then talk to jeffrey tucker of the american institute for economic research who's there for the conference but first let's get to a couple of stories topping today's business and financial headlines net neutrality the principle that internet providers like comcast and others and local internet and television service providers must treat all data on the internet the same and

not discriminate or levy divergent fees by user content website platform or the app use that service providers business not discriminate that principle was overturned by the f.c.c. the federal communications commission on a three to two party line vote in december well now democrat senators say they hold more than fifty sen votes in an attempt to challenge the repeal of net neutrality that means they have picked up at least one possibly a few republican votes this news represents a small glimmer of hope about the future fate of net neutrality and the fairness principle of access to well knowledge without net neutrality we have a century created a closed and captive media caste system where knowledge is basically being outright rationed according to a pew research study last year those who live in rural areas are about twice as likely not to even use the internet as urban or suburban americans which have more choices for news and information and faster connection speeds the debate about the

debate will continue and we'll see if those more than fifty plus senators might get a vote to overturn the recent f.c.c. net neutrality pullback. the news this morning is that i.b.m. international business sheens has reported higher revenue numbers for the first time in nearly two years and expects continued growth this year on the other side of the spectrum amex american express saw the first quarterly loss since get this one thousand nine hundred ninety two amex c.e.o. kenneth chenault all says it was do like other companies we've discussed in recent recent days on this program due to the tax bill passed at the end of last year well other stocks are making major moves this year let's bring in to the ever vested bullish the argo of stocks which you usually tells us about retail numbers but she looks at stocks every day so it's great to have you with us on this comment on this topic you want to comment on the i.b.m.

and the amex numbers look at the same chart good to see you and yes well i have it's very interesting because the stock has not made brand new all time high since two thousand and thirteen and here we are in two thousand and eighteen so to have an earnings miss like this as far as the stocks reaction like you said they had some good news in the report but their reaction was negative because the night before the earnings the stock was around one sixty nine and that gap down in the morning and the korean market around one sixty four and fell on that day so i just think that investors didn't see what they wanted to see with i.b.m. and it's really been lagging and it's had a hard time competing with the likes of microsoft which has been performing extremely well in this bullish market and how about apple stock you know they made that major announcement yesterday that they they had a pullback and they were going to supposedly create all these jobs in the u.s. although some of those they were to create anymore their stock is near an all time

high these days isn't it. yes actually i hit over one hundred eighty which is big news for the stock we're really getting closer and closer to that two hundred level which is i think what investors are looking for awful has earnings out february first so that's going to be a that's the biggest actually earnings night of the c.s. and google amazon and apple all report february first after the bell so that's going to be a big night and investors are waiting for that but i'll tell you it generate a fortune came out and apple was announced at the top of their list for the world's most admired companies so apple is still up there and you mentioned about them creating these jobs the big news today was that there repatriating two hundred fifty billion dollars of their overseas assets into the u.s. because of this new tax reform and that is huge not only is it huge for apple and the growth they're going to see and the u.s. with that money coming back it's also huge because the government is going to get

some of that money taxed over thirty billion dollars and that's all going to go into the u.s. treasury now in fairness i mean their business they're not philanthropist there dude making this move because you know the corporate tax rate was thirty eight percent it went down to twenty one but that repaid should fee is only fifteen point five percent so while they are going to pay all this money as you say melissa they're actually saving fifty billion buckaroos so it's also a big money decision for them now we talk about but what about google and alphabet for example how are they doing they were killers last year they still going strong . google still stronger than ever again made new highs with the market in the last calendar year as many times almost as the market did but i will tell you the biggest strongest stock on the market is still the beast of amazon it seems like that is headed right to fifteen hundred if it has a good quarterly earnings by anybody you know said head over thirteen hundred one

over thirteen twenty five i think there is huge expectations for that whole sector attack of this year of two thousand and eighteen that a big year in two thousand and seventeen is a lot of expectations out for that sector to continue the growth this year particularly with the savings again with tax reform all these corporations are going to benefit from that and amazon just continues to expand and expand and expand although you mentioned about apple being a company for profit which of course they are they still did not have to bring all that money back to the usa because we're going to be taxed on it which if they keep it outside of the u.s. they would be taxed on it so they still did not have to make a move like that it's probably my you know inquisitive and doubting former regulator mind at work melissa i just i see all these companies and we need them and they provide the economic engine to our democracy but when they make claims like we saw you know with with wal-mart that they're going to raise prices and then they're going to under their breath we're closing sixty sam stores i just get worried apple is already going to spend several weeks ago sixteen billion dollars

in the u.s. in a single year so for them to say they're going to spend thirty billion over five years you know that doesn't really start my engine a whole lot but there are good company that make a great product you know and so finally before we go i want to get your take on gee i mean they're talking about a break up that would be incredible what your thoughts on that and on the g.e. stock. well that's like going from apples to oranges talking about amazon and g.e. amazon is one of the strongest stocks in the market in g.s. one of the weakest a well known stocks in the market right now and it's unfortunate the last time we're talking about a brand new all time highs the g. sol brand new all time highs was back in two thousand so eighteen years ago the stock broke sixteen dollars it does report january twenty fourth so that will be an important day for the stock however they haven't really performed in this bullish market as they would have to literally got to the thirty six dollars level stop or

up sixteen so it would be a tremendous feat for them to get back up on an uptrend g.e. is in a down trend and to me it's really not a buy sell it hits up over thirty six bucks a share right now and i mean that seems unlikely could it happen yes but i think it wouldn't more likely if it had even a good earnings rally so a little bit and then take its time moving back up they had had the new c.e.o. came aboard in august of two thousand and seventeen and you really got to give the guy a chance to see what he can do here he hasn't even been at the home for a year so we'll see what he can do i mean he's going to try to turn the company around. super that is so fun to do a little round robin we want to do that again we love you on real to retail numbers that we love you on stocks most armor founder of stocks whooshed thanks as always thanks for having me. holland cook the host of the big picture here artie america did a really interesting show on friday and i've asked him to give us the cliff notes

version for you all who who missed it and you make the point that nobody is getting any younger and that's one reason why the book baby boomers may be actually creating a lot of economic ingenuity in our in our economy explain all that bart every day in the u.s. a ten thousand people turned sixty five and in the next two decades another sixty five million americans hit the big seven zero we baby boomers born one thousand nine hundred six to one thousand nine hundred sixty four were the biggest generation in history until those millennial scame along yet we outnumbered boomers remain the most consequential generation on july one twenty sixteen something began and it will never end that day the oldest baby boomers turn seventy and a half the age at which by law they are required to begin withdrawing money from ira accounts this dough squirreled away for decades and earning interest is now

flooding the retail economy. although we do occasionally ask a teenager for a tech assist boomers are tech savvy one reason young people are fleeing facebook for other social media platforms is that their parents and grandparents are there eighty three percent of boomers conduct online research before making major offline purchases which busts another myth that as we get older we're so set in our ways and so brand loyal that we don't consider new products by loney boomers are a lifelong experimenters to our parents horror way back when. baby boomers are health conscious they purchased seventy seven percent of all prescription drugs and sixty one percent of over the counter drugs already expecting to live longer than any previous generation they spend on teeth whitening and cosmetic surgery and the golden years are now baby boomers control eighty percent of all leisure travel

spending they've got the time and they've got the money there were forty million grandparents in the usa in one nine hundred eighty there will be eighty million and twenty twenty and you know they go to those grandkids so while the old media buyers on madison avenue figure twenty five to fifty four is the demographic sweet spot the numbers say they're ending to a low that's super excellent is why i want you to come and tell our viewers thank you so much if people want to catch the full monty version of the big picture we're going to get it you can see this most recent episode and all the shows we've done at youtube dot com slash the big picture our t. watch any time anywhere on any device thank you hala appreciate you being here that part. time now for a quick break but stick around because when we return manila chan talks china and economic numbers plus why have a little bit of

a dicey debate about regulating digital currencies stay tuned. yes there was but with a large employer you could stop. the of renewal but also mention i believe we'll do more through the young family wall soon will put in europe will live in if there are families where should i show off playing a part of me felt ok to handle the you know the list describes for more where you the cuckolds believe you know it's huge in a few years if the children need you to judge. you will know the

legislative the secret of the armor should do you can you get other coolies up when you're the mob boss lady of getting us all the trails and most of the president of us there. about your sudden passing i've only just learned you worry yourself and taken your last to bang turn. your act caught up to us we all knew it would i tell you i'm sorry suddenly i could so i write these last words in hopes to put to rest these things that i never got off my chest. i remember when we first met my life turned on each breath. but then my feelings started to change you talked about war like it was a game still some are fond of you those that didn't like to question our arcade and i secretly promised to never be like it said one does not leave a funeral in the same as one enters my mind it's consumed with death this one

different person to speak to now because there are no other takers place to claim that mainstream media has met its maker. spiritual people been saying about rejected a knight would still exactly just pull on off the field of the only show i go out of my way to let you know a lot of. is that really packs a punch to sleep yampa is the john oliver of hearty americans do the same we are apparently better than food let's see some people you've never heard of love redacted tonight i'm president of the world bank though kate because we're going to seriously you send us an e-mail. hey everybody i'm stephen ball. hollywood guy usual suspects every proud american first of all i'm just george bush and our visa to say this is my buddy.