sampler is not coming to town anymore. i follow these instructions. stick to the spirit of christmas. you decide. i while our officers are facing an increasingly dangerous environment, we are seeing a growing debate about so called warrior cops. the term that i've heard in the militarization of believe this is an am wrapped vehicle we acquired through the 1033 program and very free program with the government program that close military property that is no longer use to local law enforcement. with building an army over here, and i can't believe that people aren't seeing those being an agency on a terrorism here because it began appealing that ahead. you have to deal with your higher practice, who you putting in a uniform because a badge is

a powerful thing. and sometimes is like money in play tricks and people mind they think they got bad news. but what is out the door very bad? johns, are coming good news. you have job security because the world desperately need, but you applicant with this is been bus going business or you can't afford to miss. i'm rachel blood that i'm reservoir in washington. here is a way of coming up. opec plus members have agreed to booth output as the nation's convened a virtual meeting straight ahead. we discussed decision and how could level off oil price. it added an effort to see the wave of digital currency. many nations are rushing to their own project will bring you latest developments in the field. then

the binding ministration says it has a plan to take on anti competitive practices in the meat packing industry that have sent prices storing to just how much are the for largest companies impacting the cost you pay. it's a grocery store, we'll discuss. we have a lot to cover today, so let's get started. we leave the program with the latest as the oil industry, opec and it's oil producing allies have decided to stick with more of the same when it comes to output. the cars out will continue to raise in february production target by $400000.00 barrels per day, as it has done each month since august. when it began to unwind the $5800000.00 barrels per day of cuts that were put in place at the start of the pandemic. now, by the end of january, the group will be left with about $3400000.00 barrels per day of cuts to undue by the end of september. poor is it per, it's july 2021 agreement to joining us now to go in depth on that did do much co host an investigative journalist, been swan now bad. obviously this comes despite calls from the u. s. and its allies

to increase production. opec isn't really motivated significantly to increase that production. what's going on there? yeah, i think that's essentially what it is. right? opec wants to be able to make as much money as possible. we all know that, and that's not a surprise to anyone. but the fact is, is that they kind of leaned on the idea of the, on the kron very and being a reason that they were going to see a slow down and transportation again to slow down in the airline industry. and all of that, we're going to impact fuel price was actually hasn't really impact the fuel prices . and yet what we see is that opec really isn't in a rush to change anything, right? they want to keep the supply as low as they can. they're increasing by $400000.00 barrels per day, per month is what the increases right now. that's a very small amount. what's interesting about this though, is the question i guess moving forward, which is what is actually going to change in the next few months. and will there be a change in, at this point? opec has just elected essentially a new head of the cartel who's going to be running it. and nothing's really going

to change. it's going to be businesses usual. they're going to continue to do what they've done over the past couple of years. i don't think we're going to see a whole lot change, which means bad news if you are hoping the gas prices are going to drop that this winter, that those gas costs are going to be lower. if you're heating bills based on, on oil. i don't really think that's going to go down either. yeah, a lot. 7 of us are sitting there wondering about those gas prices, and at the same time, opec is kind of sitting back just collecting those profits that they at least thought that they gave up during the pandemic. now i know when we talk about oil prices, there's a lot about speculation and a lot of that comes back to politics. and at the same time, there are still huge concerns, at least from washington and european allies about russia and ukraine going to war at some point in 2022. now this seems to be a huge driver of continued energy problems. so is it affecting output at all? yeah, well, i think it's, it's not really affecting the output. what it is effecting is nice the efficiency

by which oil in natural gas can be deliver to certain parts of the world, specifically to europe. right? europe is the one that is really dependent upon, nor string to if nor string to we're approved tomorrow. it's not going to change anything for us in the united states. but certainly it's going to change the oil prices, especially in the spectrum of nature of them across the european continents and have a huge impact there. it's interesting because already hearing, i mean, just last couple of days increase to rhetoric, coming from the united states about wanting to crack down on the russians for how dare they allow nor stream to to exist. how do they try to use it? there is a weapon is ation of the terminology that's being used acting as if nor stream to is in and of itself an act of war. and i think that's very dangerous language. i don't like using the word dangerous very often. i think it's over used in our business, but i think it really is when we're talking about the potential for war and referring to an oil and natural gas pipeline between 2 sovereign nations that was

agreed to and treatment like it is an active or i think a very dangerous talk and of course as we mentioned many times, 2 of those ages, russia and me really, really, really what that project because they need it. now i want to hit on another story here because oil exports from venezuela doubled in december from a year earlier as the country raises production of revenue generating hydrocarbons in defiance of us sanctions. what's happening there with venezuela? yeah, it's a pretty interesting story and i would say this was probably flown under the radar with most people. but look, here's the bottom line. as you know, during the trump administration, there was a huge crack on the way another the effort there was to really kind of corner venezuela so that they could choke out the ability of been as way led to funded government because virtually all of that funding comes through oil, an oil reserves, the bottom line is over the last year that is women's become much more powerful. they have defy those us sanctions. as you just mentioned, their primary target their so into is china who of course, as a huge need for oil. they are buying oil from venezuela and

a lot of what they've been doing has actually been helped by iran, part of the processing of oil. because as you know, because we can't really processes oil, it has a lot of crude, but it doesn't refine it. well it runs been helping in that process and helping venezuela to do that. so it was very interesting about this right now is that yes, venezuela is acting in defiance of the us. but even the terminology, i don't like it. defiance it's like who is the us to decide who around the world gets to actually be able to process their own raw material. now the us act like they can do that, and yet here we go. so way that has been doing a pretty good job of defining and continuing to move forward. they have more than doubled their output in the last year. it's actually somewhat impressive. and under the radio, interesting, all 3 of those stories combined kind of wrap into the us trying to stick their nose into all of this boom bus. bon swan, thank you so much. you got it. and the race to create a central back bank back digital current and continues as china has

a now it's it is launching an app for the digital you want. now the app will be available for smartphones intense like cities, including beijing and shanghai. the peoples bank of china also plans to integrate the digital currency into venue at the 2022 winter olympics next month. this is just the latest step in beijing's journey to create and creating a cbc, the admin in the work since 2014. and it's not just china, more than any countries are exploring digital currencies with 14 launching pilot program. similar to what aging is doing right now, at least 16 countries, including russia, australia, and brazil are preparing to launch pilot programs as early as this year. and nearly a dozen central banks have already launch their own digital currencies, including the bahamas in nigeria. now if you're wondering where the united states falls on that list, well they're still in the research base and many said that they're falling behind on what could be the future of money as we know it. so joining us now to discuss the latest and octavio marines, the ceo of openness,

i'll see now octavio. let's start with you here. while some of the world's largest economies are showing their interest in digital currencies and moving forward with plans to make them are reality. we have yet to really hear much at all from the federal reserve, honest development of a digital dollar. why don't you think we've seen more of a push from the u. s. at this point? let me say, 1st of all, most the central bank, visual currencies are not particularly innovative at all. then the, basically just a central bank account that works the way bank kinds of always operates. but the big difference is you can't use any cash with it. so you can just execute electronic transactions, you can use an app on your phone to do that. you can do that already. so the thing, this, the great innovation that is not going to be using district technology can be centralized at the central bank, does not be anything particularly innovative about the line technology. but there is huge, huge difference in terms of who actually holds the money. now with these central

bank, digital currencies, it's the central bank that holds the money and not the commercial banking sector. so i think that's the major difference of some major innovations that economic one really not really technological. so the money is not going to be at a wells fargo or bank protection is going to be with the fed. that would be the in the u. s. such a thing. we're used. that's a big, big change and radical restart in terms of how the banking industry works. and i think to your question, why has this not happened in the u. s. i think the commercial banks in the u. s. in general, more powerful than they are in other countries. large parts of the federal reserve are actually owned by commercial bank, certainly the regional federal reserve bank. so who then appoint members, the board of governors. and so the commercial banking sector in the u. s. is probably feeling really big about this, not the number is hostile to these initiatives and isn't a better position to control it. so i think that's why the fed as not jumped on the bandwagon just yet. they were making some noise about about half a year ago. i think the commercial bank basically called the represent fit and said, we don't really want to do this. and i think that's what's happening goldman else.

christina, we've touched on this many times in the past today, is this whole effort for digital or central bank digital currency is really just an effort to keep away from the centralized crypto currency, the traditional crypto currency here. absolutely. because right now the centralized currency, it's a very big threat to the entire ecosystem. and not just that t b c's are trying to compete with just regular crypt currencies in general. not just the b 5 space because as much as the binding, the ministration tries to criticize china about china being over controlling our overbearing with their cbc. america does the exact same thing with the bio ministration. already look into bank account that hold over $600.00. so cbc are going to be the ultimate invasion of privacy. and they're doing this in order to compete with the 5 because yet the d 5 space is convoluted and it is cumbersome for a lot of the on boarding aspects for regular consumers. and in retrospect, it, it shouldn't be that way. but the great thing about crystal currency and the reason

why the crypto ecosystem is so tight knit because they value this idea of exploration and self learning. it, they create things to be challenging because then you read out just the people who get in because the height because of fomo and everything like that. the people who are truly interested in d fi, who are truly interested in learning about crypto currency. they are actually rewarded with financial gain versus people who are just trying to get on board with something simple like, don't want to shoot require something like that. c, b, c's. on the other hand, they make the barrier to entry. very easy because as we just said that absolutely no a new innovation to it, everybody uses a cell phone. everybody knows how pay power says absolutely no new innovation for that. so cbc is trying to capitalize on that, on the fact that defy is convoluted is confusing, and it is cumbersome for a lot of regular consumers right now. are covered, we covered with you. why something like the federal reserve isn't interested in c b c's. but why are other central banks into this findings base to christian point,

they're afraid of being left behind and they feel threatened by crypt occurrences. and i think they can push something forward to sort of counter that threat. but i think they are very different animals. the, the central bank currency, nothing like crypt occurrences. so the whole idea behind encrypted currency was that it couldn't be inflation or they couldn't be just expanded into the, into the trash with a central bank cryptic currency or discount to it back right back to that. i think a lot of these, these smaller central banks have not really thought through about how much work they're going to have to do in terms of customer on boarding and verify who the customers are and looking the transactions and provide the customer service. if something goes wrong, there's going to be a lot of work and they have to hire thousands, tens of thousands of people handle that. i don't think is, is really well thought through the whole thing is, i think the whole thing's really good advice. and the experience that they get through this, i'll say, well, we have to have a lot of people behind this because now on the case transactions going to go wrong and to pick up the phone and talk to someone, you have to identify the who the customer is before they enter into this

relationship with the central bias up even close to being able to do that. yeah, definitely. a lot of work there. christy, we've got less than a minute left. i'll give you the final word here in c, b, c. i think they are cumbersome, but the thing is that what he pointed out was that a lot of technology these days are passive. facebook is very passive. apple is very passive. there's absolutely no help button on the entire facebook home page. and that is actually what made them famous. it's a fact that they actually simplified everything for the user. and that's actually what the cdc is trying to do is trying to simplify everything because consumers these day, they are passive, they're not actively trying to engage with the platform. they are passive and they like to be fed things. and so that is something that the cb d. c is trying to capitalize on and it's going to be something to definitely monitor because c, b, d, c. while yes, it is a great as in. yeah, there's a block chain record for everything and makes things easier. it makes transactions simpler, cheaper, more efficient, et cetera. on the flip side of that, there's a lack of privacy. there is a lack of accountability on the other side. what happens if that data ends up in

the wrong hands? so definitely there are pros and cons to both sides of that boom bus. christy i and octavia moran z of open. miss elsie, thank you both so much for your insight. thank you. so i'm now for a quick break when we come back, the vine administration says it has a plan to tackle spiking inflation in the meat industry. will tell you what they're considering, neck, and as we go to break your, the numbers of the clothes in a oh,

oh, this isn't an orphanage. oh, even suzy. children have been paid for the fountains. house. i give them about 40 mom, my mom with much any skirt. i mean you go on a bit of a violin, mom on violet, a mom of a book. i love you flu, valuable. i would love me. i mean i use the challenge. i can only assume young

america jump on shut. i can redeem the feel, feel i should. oh, a welcome back here in the united states, the binding ministration is taking steps to rain and rising meet prices. the move comes as the white house is attempting to deal with inflation, which rose at its highest rate in nearly 40 years in november, and has become increasingly important issue for voters ahead of this year's mid term elections this week by an address,

a lack of competition in the $213000000000.00 meat packing industry and which he said before, largest companies dominate 85 percent of be production 70 percent of the pork market and 54 percent of the production of poultry. the administration hopes to bolster competition by providing funds to help regional processors compete with the giants in the field while pushing for enhanced rules on livestock purchasing and meet labeling. president biden met virtually with independent farmers and ranchers monday to discuss the initiatives. in too many industries, a handful of giant companies dominate the market. and too often they use their power to squeeze out smaller competitors and stifle new entrepreneurs, making our economy less dynamic, giving themselves free right to raise prices. i've said it before and i'll say it again. capitalism without competition, isn't capitalism? it's exploitation. that's what we're seeing and mean poultry. so well,

these latest move make any significant impact on the industry will. joining us are discussed is chris swift, swift trading company. chris, pleasure to have you back on the show. i know it's been quite a while. it is to groups that back the nation's largest meat packers have already been critical of these latest step. say this is really a workforce issue and this could actually make the problems even worse. what's your take on that? i'm not real sure how we could make it any worse. increasing our packing capacity always makes for more room for the producer to have applies to marketing. ready inventory into the better benefit seemingly coming with the smaller plants would be to the individual consumer. it wants to source their meat products, specifically from an individual producer, and then see where that they know that mate was produced. what all went in to that made production and they feel safe for having that product there that they of individually source sprung up. so we love the smaller producers out there in the packing production. that's what we're probably looking more towards is bringing on

more plants that can either process cattle or hauled in there and some that are already maybe they could increase more with robotics or even some increase in on. now, when it comes to the statement that we heard from president biden in, from the, by an administration, they have been hyper critical of a lack of competition within this space. which is allowed these big companies to squeeze out regional and smaller producers. do you see this is a major in major issue rather within the industry? well, i don't think that this new bill will do much to be able to help lower anything from the majors they are. i think that we look at vertical integration and we see that we need to produce the amount of b for our public needs to have that kind of movement through dates and berkeley integrates lines. and the supply chains i think will we have to look back is that if we go back in time, we can see from the o 9 for 2013 time frame, we're packing industry was very large. it was very antiquated. and through the next

2 to 3 years in the 20132014 thank a separate contract that they made the business decisions that were necessary to be able to make them profitable. unfortunately, at the exact same time, we saw our producers increase that supply greatly. that began to tax the current packing capacity in an over the number. ready of years for which we continued to increase those flaws, we did not increasing the pack capacity. so even today we've not increased it all that much, but enough the words robotics that have come into as well as the increase in employment has helped to work through a lot of those animals that are there were an increase of supply. i will be out of the crate to give us a lot of information. you know a lot more about this industry than i do. so the question is based all that for if you're given, are we consuming more, me here the night of states of we or we're also exporting a lot more as well. united states, no way grass is treating in court bid

b. and we know that other countries and developing countries that now have more money than what they have had before, are able to afford those products. so we are the number one seller of high grade corned beef, and that tends to be very desirable. is elise up and coming countries. now, is it a concern that when we see that, you know meat, poultry fish eggs have seen a 12.8 percent inflation rate over the last year. that you know, consumers who are already paying more and pretty much every aspect of the economy are already feeling that painted. that a can, sir. i don't think so. we will look at a to a point 8 increase on exit 8. nonsense, a garage and attention to a dollar are ribbons that were $1399.00. that takes me to $1599.00 when we look in our other aspects of healthcare and the amount of it increases our energy prices which have increased significantly. but most of those increases are all done by the mandates that the government boots on businesses that stifles the production of

those. or chris swift. i appreciate you coming. i will follow the story further. chris swift of swift trading company. thank you so much. thank you. now to the case that reads like the script for the movie, it inspired their nose founder elizabeth holmes has been found guilty of defrauding investors. after she raised $945000000.00 for her biotech company, which is valued at over $9000000000.00. now the only problem. 2 with the technology she was selling didn't work, but that didn't stop homes from attracting high profile investors, such as rupert murdoch, betsy devoss, and the walton family. but even with the verdict now reach there. so countless questions about how the business was able to reach the heights it did, and what investors can learn from it. so joining us now discuss the analysts, lionel. now, lionel, we know that elizabeth holmes was facing 11 counts total, but she was found not guilty on 4 counts related to defrauding the public. so what

was it about those 3 wire fraud charges related to her investors that led to the guilty verdict? well, let some, as he say, now let's unpack this burden the only caught charges she was found guilty of the only verdict war in defrauding investors. the acquittals came from defrauding. theoretically the patient was that tell you, same case, virtually 2 groups of people. those who put the money and those who could have died by, by virtue of this fraud, those cases were acquitted. now, the themes are incredible here, excuse me, in my humble opinion. this is more interesting than the elaine maxwell. while this is somebody who lives in silicon valley, right, there's this whole idea and there is a whole fake it till you make it idea. and in this rough and tumble brash, you know, ly perhaps to sell your product. in fact, she, even she,

she base her home countenance or look on steve jobs. this was different. this was an app. this wasn't something that was for this wasn't facebook just with people's lives. but, but brent and rachel, what i don't understand is, did any of these great investors do any due diligence? i mean, give you one particular back. every in the, in the book bad blood is fantastic. everybody who knows anything about that. and i certainly am not an expert, but it's very simple in order for you to, to do just one. just one of the series of tests that you can get from these will nano containers. you need volumes of venus, blood, a nice quantity, vacuum venus as in veins. this never could have done this. they knew this from the beginning. my question to you. anybody? what role do the media play?

what rule? duty investors play? i wanted the biggest backers of this was president. now president bind, who said this is the laboratory of the future. so that they knew this, they should have known this. all of the people who said, listen, i think you're going what we should hear because of your, of your children. when i did do, do they not have anybody in the budget walgreens bought into this thing? this is the part that amazes me. and let me tell you, is that right? she is looking at a sentence that is going to boggle your mind. this is bernie made off level. these under the federal sentencing guidelines, the number of the victims, the amount and controversy, the fact that she took this stand and the judges going to say, you lied to me over and over again. people for the 1st how brave she was taking the stack. now, you know why you don't do it. so this case is, is far from over and it fascinating in terms of the implications and why i really

have about 30 seconds left. but the trial wrote, received so much attention. obviously, as you mention, there's a great book about it. documentaries, there's a blockbuster films been ready to be released. i mean, is there danger of being another therapist or do we learn the lesson here from this? absolutely not. absolutely not because that mentality is going to be even stronger . because brent, whatever to be doing, they're going to say instead of saying, wait a minute, we to be, we don't want to be the next one. they're going to say, oh, don't worry, we are not, there are nose. so if you think they're going to pump the brakes after this, not even close legal and media analyst ally and all, thank you so much for your time and thank you for this time and get boom by on demand on the portable tv app available on smartphones and tablets, google play in the apple app store by searching for a portable tv, portable tv. you can also download it on samsung smart tv roku devices or simply check it out at portable tv. we'll see you next time. me.

ah, join me every thursday. i'm alex simon show and i'll be speaking to guess in the world, the politics sport. business. i'm show business. i'll see you then. mm . what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have. it's crazy, even foundation, let it be an arms race is on offense. very dramatic development. only personally and getting to resist. i don't see how that strategy will be successful, very critical time time to sit down and talk with at states has to be rash, to be able to afford enzyme and find the luxury that for sure. despite having the

most expensive health care system in the world, we have poor life expectancy. we have higher infant mortality. we have more deaths from treatable causes. so americans are suffering every day from it. it's as if these people don't count. i saw how they can choose your customers and dump the sick so also they can satisfy their wall street investors. no parents should have to see what i saw. so if you're denying payment for someone's care, your make life and death decision and determine to get to live and who dies to me, that's best getting away with murder.

ah, unrest sweeps conducted on over flooring fuel prices with riots, assessing police cars on fire and a state of emergency declared in chrome areas. european countries divided. oh, but you've proposal to label nuclear and gas as green forms of energy with the new german government fleming. the plant is green washing and snowstorms of grounding flights in america, with staff shortages due to cove. it also being blamed for travel kale with coming to your life from moscow you're watching off the international. my name's peter scott's here bringing the latest world news. now we start this hour with

carfax don.