Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis by Shankar A.S. Academy for the date 17th of January 2020. Today we shall be seeing some important news articles on brew refugees then on National Investigation Agency, then an editorial on mob lynching and such other news articles which are displayed here along with the page numbers of Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Trivandrum and Hyderabad editions. The handwritten notes in PDF format and the timestamping of all the news articles taken up for today's analysis is available in the description section and also in the comment section for the benefit of the smartphone news. Let us now start our analysis. This news article is about a quadripartite pact which was signed between the Government of India and the State Governments of Tripura, Mizoram and the Brew Riyang representatives. This pact was signed with an intention to end the 23-year-old Brew Riyang refugee crisis. So under this new pact, thousands of brew refugees will be settled in Tripura. So in the context of this news article, let us see in brief about the brew refugees and how they got displaced to Tripura from Mizoram and the efforts of the central government to rehabilitate the displaced tribes. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this news article is given here for your reference. First, let us see in brief about these brew tribes. They are also called as Riyang tribes. They are one of the schedule tribes in the state of Tripura. Their traditional name is Brew. So they are interchangeably called as Brew tribes or Riyang tribes. And if you see, they are the second largest tribe in the state of Tripura and they are also listed as a particularly vulnerable tribal group in the state of Tripura. They are spelled as R-I-A-N-G Riyang in this PBTG list which is given by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Government of India. These brew refugees who are now in Tripura were earlier living in the state of Mizoram and also in the Chittagong Hill Tracks in the country of Bangladesh. Now how these tribes got displaced? See in the year 1997, when these tribes were living in the state of Mizoram, the Brew National Union which represented these brew tribes passed a resolution. In the resolution, it demanded an autonomous district council under the sixth schedule of the Constitution of India in the western areas of Mizoram. But if you see in this western area of the Mizoram state, the brew tribes were present in sizable numbers but the Mizos formed the majority. So the demand by the brew tribes for an autonomous district council was opposed by the Mizoram Government and also by the Young Mizos Association. So this created a communal tension between the Mizo and Brew communities. As a result of the communal tensions around 5,000 families which comprised around 30,000 Riyan Tribals fled from the state of Mizoram to the neighboring state of Tripura in 1997 and the displaced tribals were housed in temporary camps at Kanshanpur which is located in North Tripura and they were living in tents all these years in subhuman conditions. Nothing much happened for the next 10 to 15 years. Then if you see since 2010, the Government of India has been making sustained efforts to permanently rehabilitate these brew refugees but no solution could be reached all these years. Meanwhile, the Union Government was assisting the two state governments, the state governments of Tripura and Mizoram, for taking care of the refugees. Till 2014, around 1,600 brew young families returned to Mizoram in different batches and if you see on 3rd July 2018 an agreement was signed between the Union Government, the two state governments and representatives of the brew refugees to repatriate the brew tribes back to Mizoram. So as a part of this agreement around 328 families which comprised around 1,369 tribals returned to Mizoram and also the aid that was given to these refugee families was increased substantially as a part of this agreement. But still a large number of brew tribes are still in Tripura and they did not wish to go back to Mizoram because they worried about their security if they again went back to Mizoram. So there was a sustained demand of most of the brew families that they may be allowed to settle down in Tripura itself. So in the previous year that is in 2019, again fresh negotiations started for the permanent settlement of brew refugees in Tripura itself and for this purpose a new quadripartite pact was signed yesterday. Here quadripartite pact means a pact or an agreement signed between four parties, quad means four. So the four parties are the Union Government, the two state governments Tripura, Mizoram and the representatives from brew tribes. Now under this agreement the following arrangements are made. One is that this pact facilitates the permanent settlement of around 34,000 brew refugees in Tripura itself. Next the central government will give aid to the state governments to help with the rehabilitation of brew refugees and also for the overall development of these brew refugees. Next under this agreement it has been agreed that the brew tribals would now be included in Tripura's order list and they would also get all the rights that a normal resident of the state would get. Then the brew tribals would also now be able to enjoy the benefits of the social welfare schemes of the central government as well as the state government. And under this pact it has also been agreed that the brew tribals will get a plot of land in Tripura along with a fixed deposit of rupees 4 lakh for two years. So this quadripartite pact seeks to put an end to the 23-year-old brew or ryang refugee crisis and this agreement has been welcomed by the Mizoram brew displaced peoples forum. But if you see the indigenous non-tribal communities who live in Tripura are not happy with this agreement. They have organized protests blaming the brew tribes that they are responsible in many ways for damaging the ethnic solidarity of tribals and non-tribals at Kanshanpur in Tripura. So this is all about the discussion of this news article. In this news article we have seen in brief about the brew tribes also called as ryang tribes then about how they got displaced from Mizoram to Tripura and the quadripartite pact that has been discussed in this news article. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. This news article is about the national investigation agency taking over the case of Jamun Kashmir police officer who was arrested with the militants recently. So in the context of this news article let us discuss about this national investigation agency and its functions. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this news article is given here for your reference. We know that over the past several years India has been a victim of large-scale terrorism which has been sponsored from across the borders and there have been innumerable incidents of terrorist attacks not only in the militancy and in the insurgency affected areas but also in the areas affected by left-wing extremism and in the form of terrorist attacks, bomb blast etc in various parts of India including the major cities and the hinterlands. Now if you see all these incidents they have some complex interstate and international linkages and there are also possible connections with other activities like smuggling of arms and drugs then pushing in and circulation of fake Indian currency then infiltration from across the borders etc. So keeping all these in view it was felt that there was a need for setting up an agency at the central level for investigation of offenses related to terrorism and certain other acts which has national level implications. If you see several experts and committees including the administrative reforms commission came up with many recommendations for establishing such a central agency. So as a result in the year 2008 the national investigation agency act was passed and national investigation agency was formed as a statutory body. Now let us see the silent features of this national investigation agency act of 2008. See this act extends to the entire India and it also applies to citizens of India who are outside India then it applies to persons who are in the service of the government wherever they may be and it also applies to persons on ships and aircrafts which are registered in India and wherever they are across the world. Now if you see this national investigation agency can investigate and prosecute for offenses under the acts which are specified in the schedule of this national investigation agency act of 2008 there are around some seven acts mentioned here and also the national investigation agency can investigate and prosecute for offenses under the Indian penal code under the sections that are mentioned here. So all these offenses are called as the scheduled offenses since they are mentioned in the schedule under this act. Now let us see the objectives of national investigation agency. This national investigation agency aims to set the standards of excellence in counter-terrorism and other national security related investigations at the national level by developing into a highly trained and a partnership oriented workforce. Next if you see this national investigation agency aims at creating deterrence that is to discourage the activities of the existing and the potential terrorist groups or individuals. Then if you see this national investigation agency will contain all the information related to terrorism so it will act as a storehouse of all terrorist related information. Here you need to note that the superintendents of this national investigation agency is vested in the central government. So a director general will be appointed on the behalf of the central government he will take care of the administration of this national investigation agency. So he has powers equivalent to a director general of police of the police force in any state government. So know that this director general will be appointed by the central government. Next let us see on what grounds will the national investigation agency investigate a particular case. First if a state government feels that there is a reasonable ground that a scheduled offense under this NA act has been committed then it can request the central government to take over the investigation of such a case and if the central government feels the same then it will direct the national investigation agency to investigate that particular case. Next if you see the central government also has the authority to issue directions to the national investigation agency to take over the investigation of a case Suomoto that is by itself. So during such investigation the state government shall extend all the assistance and cooperation to the national investigation agency for the investigation of the scheduled offenses. So both these are the grounds for the national investigation agency to investigate on the cases. Next if you see under section 11 of this national investigation agency act the central government is authorized to constitute special courts for trial of the scheduled offenses. The central government has the authority to decide on the jurisdiction of the special court and the center's decision is final. The special court shall be presided over by a judge to be appointed by the central government on the recommendation of the chief justice of the high court. Next if you see there is section 22 of this act which authorizes the state governments to constitute special courts for trial of the schedule offenses. So both central government and the state government can constitute special courts for trial of the schedule offenses. Here you need to note that an appeal on any judgment, sentence or order of a special court shall be made at the high court and every such appeal shall be heard by a bench which consists of two judges in the high court and that particular appeal case has to be disposed of within a period of three months from the date of admission of the appeal. So this is regarding the appeal on any judgment order or sentence of the special court and about the special court. So these are some of the important functions of the national investigation agency. Now if you see in the year 2019 an amendment was made to the 2008 national investigation agency act. Now this amendment act aims at enhancing the jurisdiction of the national investigation agency. Now as per this amendment the national investigation agency will investigate the schedule offenses which are committed outside India that targets Indians as well as the Indian assets abroad. So this amendment will enable the national investigation agency to additionally investigate offenses related to human trafficking, then counterfeit currency, then manufacture or sale of prohibited arms, then cyber terrorism and the offenses under the Explosive Substances Act of 1908. So this is about the recent amendment made to this national investigation agency act. Now with this let us discuss the news article. We know that recently a Jamun Kashmir police officer named Devinder Singh was arrested with two wanted Isbul Mujahidin militants. According to the news article the union home ministry has given the go ahead to the national investigation agency to take over this case. So this is all about this news article with the help of this news article. Today we saw about national investigation agency and its functions in detail. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. This editorial is about mob lynching. It speaks about the increasing incidence of mob lynching in India and then it also speaks about the Supreme Court's guidelines for central and state governments in order to frame laws to deal with the crime of mob lynching. So in this context the author has quoted certain provisions of certain state governments which have passed bill on mob lynching and then the author suggests the central government that it should replicate some of the provisions from these bills which have been passed by certain state government when framing a central law for mob lynching. So in this context we will be discussing what is meant by mob lynching, then the Supreme Court's view on mob lynching and guidelines and then we will see about the bills which have been passed by the state governments which are mentioned in this editorial and finally the author's suggestions. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this editorial is given here for your reference. First let us know what is meant by mob lynching. See mob lynching can be defined as an extrajudicial killing of a person by a mob that is by a group of people. Why it is called extrajudicial because it does not involve any fair trial. Just by taking emotions into their hands a particular group of people will get instigated and they might kill a person and if you see this trend of mob lynching as increased over the past few years and because of this there is an increased sense of insecurity among the marginalized communities based on caste lines and religious lines and if you see even at the central level there is no directive to curb the challenges caused due to mob lynching.  Hate crimes are nothing but the crimes that are carried out because of prejudice or hate towards a person or a group on the basis of their religion, race, caste etc. For example in the name of cow protection there is prevention of sale of beef or transport of cattle in certain pockets of country and sometimes you can see news related to mob lynching in the name of cow protection. So the mob takes the process of enforcing law into their own hands without any legal authority and they lead to extrajudicial killings. In the year 2018 the Supreme Court described lynching as a horrendous act of mobocracy meaning horrific acts by the masses that is by the people without any legal authority. So the supreme court requested the central government and the state governments to frame laws to criminalize mob lynching so that it will instill a sense of fear among those people who involve in mob lynching and if you see the supreme court also laid down certain guidelines to be incorporated in these laws like fast-track trials then adequate compensation to victims then disciplinary action against lax law enforcers that is against those law enforcers who do not enforce the law properly. Next if you see the author of this bill as quoted builds on mob lynching passed by certain state governments as examples. He has mentioned that so far three states have given legislative backing to the guidelines issued by the supreme court which we saw now. Manipur was the first state to come up with a bill followed by the states of Rajasthan and West Bengal. First let us see the bill which has been passed by the Manipur government. See the Manipur government initially promulgated an ordinance in November 2018 and few days later the state legislature of Manipur passed the Manipur protection from mob violence act. Now before seeing this act also note that one of the suggestions given by the supreme court is to create a nodal officer to control such crimes of mob lynching in every state and also to come up with special courts and enhanced punishments. So the supreme court guidelines is a basis for the bills that have been introduced by these three states. Now let us see the Manipur bill. This bill empowers the state government to impose a collective fine on the inhabitants of an area if the government is satisfied that they are involved in lynching or a connected offense. So imposing collective fine is one feature of this bill. The next feature is that there would be nodal officers in each district to control such mob lynching crimes. Then next feature is that police officers who fail to prevent the lynching are liable to be imprisoned for 1 to 3 years with a fine limit of 50,000. Now their numbers are not important but know that there are penal actions against those police officers who fail to prevent the lynching. Then if you see this bill which has been passed by Manipur has also specified that there is no concurrence of state government that is required in order to prosecute the police officers for dereliction of duty. That is if they do not perform the duty as tasked upon them. So for such prosecution the concurrence of the state government is not required. Then if you see this bill also provides for adequate monetary compensation to the victims or to their immediate kins and there is also provision on this bill to protect the victims of mob violence and witnesses. Also the state government may initiate schemes for rehabilitation and setting up relief camps wherever a community is displaced because of mob violence. So these are some of the important provisions in this bill that has been passed by the Manipur state. Next if you see a similar such bill was passed by Rajasthan which is called the Rajasthan protection from lynching bill 2019. In this editorial the author mentions that after the year 2014 86 percentage of the total cases of mob lynching in India were reported from the state of Rajasthan. So in order to curb such incidents the state government of Rajasthan passed the Rajasthan protection from lynching bill 2019 but if you see this bill implemented only few guidelines which were issued by the Supreme Court and this bill did not contain any provisions for penal action to be initiated against police officers who may be accused of dereliction of duty whereas if you remember the Manipur bill had a penal provision. Next if you see the author has mentioned the bill which has been passed by the state government of West Bengal which is the West Bengal prevention of lynching bill 2019. Here the state government has come up with a most stringent law against mob lynching. For example there is a punishment for lynching the punishment is death penalty or life imprisonment and a fine of up to five lakhs but this bill is still under the process of becoming an act. So we can see that bills have been passed by certain state governments to act upon mob lynching. Now in the final part of the editorial the author has given some suggestions to the central government for framing a stringent law against mob lynching by replicating certain stringent provisions from the state bills that we have discussed so far. Here the author has touched upon four important points. One is to incorporate a provision in the to be introduced bill for penal action against doctors especially against those doctors who derelict the duty like when they delay in attending the victims of mob violence or when the doctors who submit false reports without proper medical examination of the victims. The author suggests that such doctors must get punished under the law that is to be introduced by the central government. Next the author has discussed about imposing collective fines on the villages where the lynching has taken place. He tells that under the compensation scheme for victims the amount that has to be paid to the victims family should be recovered from those perpetrators of the crime that is those who have done the crime or collective fines should be imposed in the villages where the mob lynching has taken place. So this is one suggestion given by the author. Next if you see the author has suggested that the center could even provide for punitive actions against the political leaders who are found guilty of inciting the mob to involve in mob lynching. So punitive actions against political leaders is the next suggestion. Next if you see the author has also suggested for punitive actions against police officers who are accused of dereliction of duty. He tells that similar to the Manipur bill a provision can be included in the bill that is to be introduced by the central government in the parliament. So these are some of the important suggestions that have been given by the author to the central government in order to have a stringent approach against mob lynching. The author concludes this editorial by saying that until a zero tolerance attitude is adopted the mob lynching will continue to show a rising trend even in the future. This is all about the analysis of this editorial. In this editorial we have discussed about what is meant by mob lynching then we saw the supreme court's view on mob lynching and the guidelines issued by the supreme court then we saw about the bills that have been introduced by three state governments Manipur, Rajasthan and West Bengal to act against mob lynching and finally we saw the author's suggestions to the central government on what the central government could learn from the bills that have been passed by the state government when it is about to introduce a bill on preventing mob lynching. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. This news article is about Shanghai Cooperation Organization or in short HCO. The syllabus that is relevant to the analysis of this news article is given here for your reference. First let us see about Shanghai Cooperation Organization from prelims point of view. See this Shanghai Cooperation Organization is an intergovernmental multilateral platform. When we tell multilateral platform it means a platform where there are three or more countries which participate or we can tell three or more governments participate. Hence this is called as an intergovernmental multilateral platform. The formation of SCO was declared on 15th June 2001 in Shanghai which is located in China. Hence the name Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Initially this SCO was called as Shanghai Five and this Shanghai Five was established in the year 1996 and when this was formed it had only five members as the name indicates. The five members are the countries of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Turchkistan. So the main purpose of establishing Shanghai Five was to deal with the boundary issues between China, Russia and the newly independent five states of the Central Asian region. But if you see only three countries participated which are Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Turchkistan. Later in the year 2001 this Shanghai Five included Uzbekistan. So that was the time when this Shanghai Cooperation Organization was formed. Currently if you see the Shanghai Cooperation Organization consists of eight full members. Now as you can see in this map the countries which are the full-time members of Shanghai Cooperation Organization are India, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Pakistan, Russia, Turchkistan and Uzbekistan. Then this Shanghai Cooperation Organization also has four observer states which are the countries of Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran and Mongolia. Also SEO has seven countries as dialogue partners. They are the countries of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Cambodia, Nepal, Turkey and Sri Lanka. Note that among the five republics of Central Asia only Turkmenistan has not joined the organization as a member country. So remember this and know that India and Pakistan became members of Shanghai Cooperation Organization on 9th of June 2017 with the support of all the member states of Shanghai Cooperation Organization. So India and Pakistan together became a member of SEO in 2017. Next let us see the SEO Charter in Brief. See this Charter came into effect in the year 2003. This document discusses about the aims, and certain terms and conditions for the functioning of the organization. Now this SEO Charter aims for strengthening the mutual trust and neighborliness among the member states. Then it also aims to promote the cooperation in areas of politics, trade, energy, transport, tourism, economy, education, research and technology, culture and environmental protection. Then this Charter also calls for making joint efforts in order to maintain an inch of peace, security and stability in the region and moving towards the establishment of a democratic, fair and rational new international political and economic order. Next know that the Heads of State Council is the SEO's highest decision making body. This Heads of State Council meets annually that is once in a year and it takes decisions and it adopts guidelines on all important matters of the SEO. There are two permanent bodies in this Shanghai Cooperation Organization. One is the SEO Secretariat and the next is the Executive Committee of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure, in short RATS. Know that the Secretariat of SEO is located at Beijing which is the capital of China and SEO RATS is based in Tashkent which is the capital of Uzbekistan. So SEO RATS is a permanent body of SEO. This SEO RATS intends to facilitate the coordination and interaction between the competent authorities of the member states of SEO to fight against terrorism, extremism and separatism. So we can tell that SEO is also working on security related issues. The main function of this SEO RATS is Coordination and Information Sharing and since India has become a full-time member in this SEO, India has been consistently participating in all the activities of SEO RATS. This is all about Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the SEO RATS that you need to know from Prelims Point of View. Now let us discuss this news article. This news article tells that India will invite the Prime Minister of Pakistan for the Shanghai Council Meet that is for the Heads of Government Council Meeting of this Shanghai Cooperation Organization. It is nothing but the Heads of State Council which we discussed just now. We saw that Heads of State Council is the highest decision making body. So the official from the Ministry of External Affairs has said that India will definitely invite all the eight members of this Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the four observer states and other international dialogue partners to attend this annual Heads of State Council Meeting. If you see last year this annual Heads of State Council Meeting was held at Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan and this year this meeting will be held in India. This news is important because the Prime Minister of Pakistan Mr Imran Khan has never visited India since he has assumed office in 2018. This is an evolving news article we need to wait and watch the developments. So from this news article try to know about Shanghai Cooperation Organization from Prelims Point of View. You can make use of the picture that is given in this news article to know about the members, the observer states and the dialogue partners. Then it has also mentioned about the permanent bodies of this Shanghai Cooperation Organization which we saw. Now have a look at the practice question. Let us move on to the next news article. This news article is about the direction given by the National Commission for Minorities to the Kerala Police. It is about filing a detailed report regarding the allegations of a program which is called as Lao Jihad where there are reports that young Christian men and women are targeted and they are converted to Islam and then they have left Kerala to join the Islamic State in Afghanistan and Syria. So the National Commission for Minorities has expressed its concerns that at least 21 persons among those people who are suspected to have left Kerala have been converted to Islam from Christianity under this Lao Jihad. Now just know in one or two lines about this news article what you need to know is about the National Commission for Minorities from exam point of view. We have discussed in detail about this National Commission for Minorities in our 25th November 2019 analysis. We request the viewers to have a look at the video to know in detail about the National Commission for Minorities. Where we have discussed about the notified minorities in India, then about the composition of the commission, its term of office, then about the functions of the commission and the important constitutional provisions which discuss indirectly about minorities. Here one point that you need to know is that the constitution of India does not define the word minority anywhere in the Indian constitution. It only refers to minorities and it speaks of those minorities based on religion or language and it speaks about the rights of such minorities in detail. So try to remember that minorities has not been defined in the Indian constitution. Now try to remember this fact because in 2019 a similar such question was asked wherein a statement was given that the word office of profit is clearly defined in the Indian constitution that particular statement was wrong. So try to remember such unique facts. Now let us move on to the practice questions discussion session. Look at this question, consider the following pairs, tribes and the states have been given. You need to choose the correct pairs. Look at the first pair Riyang tribes Tripura. This pair is correct. In fact if you see all the tribes which are given here are those tribes which come under the particularly vulnerable tribal group as classified by the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. So Riyang is a PVTG tribe in the state of Tripura. So the first pair is correct. Now look at the second pair Jaravas Mizoram. This pair is wrong because Jaravas are a PVTG tribe in Andaman and Nicobar islands. The other PVTG tribes who live in Andaman and Nicobar islands are great Andamanis, Onjas, Sentinelis and Shampans. So the second pair goes wrong. Now look at the third pair Irular Puducheri. Now we need to know that only the union territory of Andaman and Nicobar islands have tribes which come under this particularly vulnerable tribal group. No other union territory has tribals under this PVTG group. So the third pair goes wrong. Irular tribes are listed as PVTG in Tamil Nadu. The other PVTG tribes in Tamil Nadu are Katunaikan, Kota, Kurumbas, Panyan and Thoda. If you remember in 2019 prelims exam there was a question on particularly vulnerable tribal group in which there was a statement Irulars and Kondaredi are particularly vulnerable tribal groups. So the third pair goes wrong. Now you need to choose the correct pairs. The correct answer here is option A1 only. Now look at this next question which is on National Investigation Agency. Two statements have been given and you need to choose the correct statements. Look at the first statement. It tells that National Investigation Agency is an executive body formed under the Ministry of Home Affairs with an objective to lead counter-terrorism and other national security related investigations. This statement is wrong because the National Investigation Agency is a statutory body. When we say statutory body, it has been formed as per a statute or a law. In this case it is the National Investigation Agency Act of 2008 and this agency comes under the Ministry of Home Affairs. So it is a statutory body not an executive body. So the first statement goes wrong. Now if you look at the second part of this first statement which speaks about the objective to lead counter-terrorism and other national security related investigations this part is correct. Look at the second statement. It tells that the superintendents of the agency vests in the central government. This statement is correct. As per Section 4 of this National Investigation Agency Act of 2008, the superintendents of this National Investigation Agency vests in the central government. So the second statement is correct. Now we need to choose the correct statements. The correct answer here is option B2 only since the first statement is wrong. Now look at the next question which is about the Executive Committee of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure, in short RATS. The question is this RATS is a permanent body of which of the following grouping? Here the correct answer is option B, Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Shanghai Cooperation Organization has two permanent bodies. One is the SEO secretariat which is based in Beijing and the next one is the Executive Committee of the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure, RATS which is based in Tashkent. The director of this SEO RATS is appointed by the council of heads of state for a term of three years and know that India is a member of SEO since 2017. So the correct answer to this question is option B, Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Now look at this main question. The question is Supreme Court described lynching as a horrendous act of mobocracy. The Supreme Court has laid down guidelines for prevention of mob violence and lynching against any cast or community in this regard. What are the initiatives taken based on these guidelines at the level of center and the states? Discuss with examples. So here the actual question is what are the initiatives taken based on the Supreme Court guidelines regarding mob lynching at the level of center and at the level of states? You need to discuss with certain examples. Since this is a Tenma question focus on some of the initiatives taken by different state governments like Manipur, Rajasthan, West Bengal which we discussed during our analysis and also about the initiative taken at the center level. As of now there is no law which has been enacted by the parliament. You can mention that. Now don't focus much on the Supreme Court guidelines but focus on the initiatives taken at the center level and at the state level. Please post your answers in the comments section and we shall review your answers and give suitable suggestions and feedback within the next seven to ten working days. With this we come to the end of the analysis of all the news articles taken up for today's discussion and also the practice questions discussion session. If you like the video press the like button comment and share and do subscribe to Shankar IAS Academy YouTube channel for latest videos and updates. Stay focused and motivated friends. Thank you.


The following is a presentation of TFNN, the morning market's kickoff with your host Tommy O'Brien. Good Friday morning everybody. I'm Tommy O'Brien, coming to you live from TFNN just after 9 a.m. Eastern time. We got about 24 minutes to go until the start of trading. You got markets picking things up in negative territory quite the day yesterday. Chairman Powell speaking at about 12 noon Eastern time answering some questions with David Weston of Bloomberg later in that session, and boy you talk about a sell-off, man. We are about 70 points, 7-0. Now what's interesting is 70 points below where we were on that nice double top we got yesterday. It's actually a triple top, right? Let's put it back to a five minute chart, taking a look at this action just yesterday. Yeah, you spiked higher at 12 o'clock on the statement being released. You accelerate lower to 43-20 after popping at 12-20 to that same level and then boom, the run really began at about 1 o'clock in the afternoon yesterday from 43-60. You got below 43-100 near the close yesterday. We're just below that level this morning. Now I mentioned you back it up 10 days, right? I started off this week talking about 70 points, right? We got a 70-point range in the S&P. Now we got a VIX pushing somewhere near 20 this morning. We'll pull that up in a moment, but check out the action. Last Thursday, we're going back eight days ago folks, 44-30 down to 43-60. You're talking about 70 points, okay? The next day on Friday, we go from 44-07 down to 43-40, excuse me. Again, a few points shy of a 70-point acceleration. What do we do? We drive right back up to that price point of about 70 points higher and then we're talking about moving now folks, 130 points to the downside, either way, large moves in this market. We're in negative territory today. I'm not sure how you save yourself on Friday. We're pushing $21 on the VIX this morning, 21-19. NASDAQ 100 or off by 61 points, that's about four-tenths percent of the red. The Dow this morning, off by 92 points, that's about a quarter percent of the red. Russell, off by 7 points, four-tenths percent in the red this morning. How about the week for Bitcoin, right? Remember when Bitcoin used to trade like a growth stock? Not the case anymore, man. Bitcoin is trading like gold or crude right now. Bitcoin above 30,000, 30,465 in the overnight session, this morning session, really. We were up there at 6.30 in the morning. We've pulled back a bit just under 30,000 at 29,715, Ethereum up at 16.12. How about crude, man? That's going to be the first headline we hit this morning as the risk of war is escalating and that tends to be what happens, which is so worrisome anytime. Is that escalation is a lot easier than de-escalation? And you're seeing it happen with Lebanon and the border with Lebanon right now. Crude catches quite a bit, man. Yesterday, we had an 85 handle. We just almost got up to $90 this morning. We're pushing $89.25. Check out that gold contract. It's not stopping. Partying like it's 1997 gold, almost at $2,000 this morning. Check it out. That gold contract, man. Look at the run this thing is at. Two weeks ago, we're at $18.22 and we are pushing $2,000 in the price of gold. You back it up on a three-year weekly. You've only been over here a couple of times, right? The beginning of 2022, let's do it five years to get the COVID. There it is. So we're bumping. We're bumping up against that 2000 mark. We've gotten above there a couple of times. This is a weekly basis on the gold contract. We got there in 2020 on the heels of the pandemic, right? The acceleration to 2089. We got up to a price point of 2,078 in the beginning of last year in March and we got up to a price point of 2,085. So pretty remarkable. The three tops we have here, 2,089, 2,078 and 2,085. All those tops within $12 of each other going back on a five-year basis. So gold coming up to that 2,000 mark. It's a mental number. 2,000 folks, if you're thinking about trying the gold report, check it out. Today's Friday, you got new issues out every Monday morning. You can see the archives, the positions my dad has in there and boy, it's been quite an acceleration in that gold contract to put it lightly. No Tim Bonds. So we actually got a 5% print in yields. We got there. Pop the champagne. It's Friday. We got 5% risk-free returns on a 10-year treasury. We take a look at a 10-minute chart. You're down to 10510 yesterday. Let's zoom in on the action. That's interesting. Here's the 10-year, right? Over to CNBC. I wonder when we actually got it. Let's see. Yeah, because check it out. Even on this chart, right, it's showing a print at five o'clock last night, but we just had another run. I mean, look at the run we just had, man. Just shy of 8.30 this morning. It's showing a print of 4.99 and shown we're at 4.96 right now. There's your price action. So we're 8 ticks above, 7 ticks above, 8 ticks above that spike low. We got it at about 8.30. That was correlated to a 5% yield. You're pushing 4.96% right now, the yield on that 10-year. I've been talking about the five-year ladder, the CD rate for a five-year ladder pushing almost 5.2% this morning, 5.19, I think was the number. If you're laddering, excuse me, a five-year bank CD, right, through a brokerage-issued CD, 5.2%, man, risk-free over a five-year basis. The reason why it's cool when you're laddering it is, number one, you're getting that cash flow back in case you need it, but if you're just reinvesting it, you have less duration risk because every 12 months you get to reset that rate according to what the bank CD rate is. If inflation is going up, rates are going to be going up. You'll be able to capitalize on a higher yield. If inflation is going down, rates are going to be going down.  You lock in 5.2% right now.  It's only the first segment of the program, but yields are in focus, man. The reason why I bring up the five-year ladder is because what if inflation goes up again? What if we get another acceleration, right? What if we get another acceleration to five or six or seven percent? Then your five-year CD that you locked in at 4.9% is going to be losing you real yield. That's why it's cool that you reset that yield on a ladder, no matter what you're doing. If you're looking for fixed income to lock in that yield, anyway, it's something I'm keeping my eye on because it's pretty remarkable we're pushing 5.2%. Are we going to be pushing 5.5% to 6%? 7%? We'll see. This economy is hot. We've got Raphael Bostic out here talking this morning and saying cuts aren't coming until late 2024 and we're entering the quiet period on the heels of Chairman Powell yesterday. All right. We jump over to the dollar index this morning with the 10-year. Pretty interesting here, right? Dollar really got ahead of things, man. The dollar is trading right where it was. This is a daily, so you're going back September 26. The dollar is trading where it was September 26.  The 10-year was still sitting at 108, so we've dropped two full points as in yields have risen dramatically in that period, even since September 26, right? You were trading at 108 right then in the 10-year, you're more than two full points below that level at 105.24, but the dollar really saw that one coming, man, with the acceleration it had since July. From 100 to 106, it's settling a bit at 106.20 right now. We get the 10-year. I've been talking about this channel line, man. I can't believe it's actually happened as quick as it happened. I remember talking about it when we got that spike to 108.16 saying maybe 105 is the bottom of that channel line. We hit 105.10 this morning. Stay tuned, folks. Lots to talk about on Friday. We'll get some earnings. We'll take a look at American Express when we get back. Stay tuned. If you're looking for potential trading setups in the stock market, then Rocket Equities and Options Report is a newsletter you should try. Tommy O'Brien delivers options and equity trades when the markets present them, using a combination of fundamentals and technicals. Sign up for Rocket Equities and Options Report today with a 30-day money-back guarantee so you have nothing to risk. For all the details and to start your subscription today, visit the front page of TFNN.com. TFNN, educating investors. Everything in the universe is governed by the Fibonacci sequence. 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TFNN has launched the Tiger's Den, hosted at Discord. TFNN has been educating traders for more than 20 years, with live programming hosted by a variety of professional traders during market hours. The Tiger's Den, available to all Tigers and Tigresses for just $1 for the year. There's no catch or added costs when you join our community of traders. Sign up today and become a part of this educational community of traders. Just visit the front page of TFNN.com. Welcome back, folks. We have the S&Ps off by about 11 points right now, trading to $42.91.  You're talking about an area of confidence at about the $4,200 range from $4199.63. We'll call it $4,200 down to $4,141. And what I'm taking there is the Fibonacci retracement zones of two different trends. You're talking about the acceleration this market had from March of $3,800 in change to where we were in August at $46,34. It's more than a 20% acceleration off of the lows. Pretty remarkable, OK? Now, that is the first trend we're looking at. And the 618 of that area is at about $4,141. But you back things up a little bit further. And you look at the run this thing had off of the lows from $3,500. You're talking about an area where you run the Fibonacci off the recent highs in July, and the 3A2 brings you right down to that $4,200. Now, what's so cool about this area is that, number one, you had a little bit of an area of resistance in May before you started kind of the next leg up in this acceleration short term. You also had a brief high in January of this year. And you also had that spike high that we were at in December of $4,180. So all of those are still potentials, man. When you're getting in volatility like we're getting right now, we are about a week and a half out from a Fed decision. Interesting to see the action yesterday and let of what Chairman Powell said. The first headlines that came out were all about that he had basically indicated that they were pausing on the November 1st meeting. Then he got further into his question and answer. And the market wasn't quite comfortable and you traded down 70 S&P points from where we were yesterday and you're coming into Friday action of $4,292. So we will see. Before we jump to American Express, I'm going to jump to Mr. Bostic, like I was talking about. Atlanta Fed Reserve President Rafael Bostic said today, he doesn't envision rate cuts happening until well into 2024. And the numbers he talks about here are pretty simple. 3.7% is where we are and we got to be to 2%. Well, good luck. I would say late 2024, he replied, when asked for a timeframe, when the first decrease could come. Now here's what I'll say about this. They're on the Fed. So their opinion matters, but it's just an opinion. The further out you go into the future, the more it is just kind of guessing. Okay. It's remarkable that we are now 19 months into the hiking cycle. Remember when they began in March of 2022? What is that? 7 months? Yeah, we're 7 plus 12, 19 months into the hiking cycle. They've hiked 11 times for a total of 5 and a quarter percentage points. And the numbers he's talking about, like I'm saying, I really do try and keep people focused on what inflation is. Still at 3.7%, our target is 2%. They're not the same and we have to get a lot closer to 2% before we're going to consider any kind of relaxation of our posture. Now here's the thing I'll say about this before we jump to American Express. There's a very real argument to be made, regardless of what Chairman Powell was saying yesterday, that as inflation comes down and we have interest rates from the Fed sitting at 5 and a quarter to 5.5% as they hamper growth and they bring down growth a bit and they bring down inflation, what's going to happen is, is that the longer they remain at the interest rate they're at, which is pushing 5.5%, the more restrictive just staying at the same rate gets. So I'm trying to keep that in mind myself because if they do get a hold of inflation, and it does begin to drop to 2.7%, I mean, they love that one, right? We got crude prices hitting 100 bucks this morning. So that is going to complicate things, but you're going to hear the argument be made that, listen, we still want to be in a restrictive rate environment because we still have work to do, but we don't need to be at 5.5% when there's a huge gap between where inflation and growth are and where our interest rate policy from the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee is. So that is going to be the leap that they first make when they have to cut, and it's not going to be that they have to be at 2% and be done because it's still going to be restrictive. When they're at 2.7%, maybe they bring that rate down to 4.7%, right? When they're at 2.5%, maybe they bring it down to 4.5%. When they're at 2.25%, maybe they bring it all the way down to 4%. Maybe they bring it down to 3.75% once they're that close. So that that is something to keep in mind. Yes, they do have to get closer than 3.7%, probably. And late 2024 is not as far as it seems into the future, because guess what? Late 2024 is only 12 months away. We are 19 months into the hiking cycle. And just yesterday, the market was waiting to see whether we're going to get one more hike. It seems like they're putting that on a pause from November. A lot of analysts were saying they may be done for 2023 in terms of the final couple of months of the year. They let it play out. Doesn't mean that's going to be the case with next year, though. And you're only talking about late 2024. For cuts, hopefully that's the case because that means inflation is calm. But what it also means is that you may need to stimulate the economy, which is the next worry. That doesn't seem to be the case right now, though, as the economy seems to be alive and well to put it lightly, right? Retail sales 0.7%. How about it? OK, let's jump to American Express. Record profit as customers flock to pricey cards. So, you know, credit cards are double-edged sword, man. You pay it off every month. You better believe you should be taking advantage of the cash rewards, the kickback, all of that stuff.  Maybe more than you can afford. And by the time you realize it, you've got a credit card bill that right now is probably pushing what, 23, 24, 28 percent on some of those credit cards. Nonetheless, they report 15.4 billion in revenue that was above estimates and was above the 13.6 well above it generated in the same period a year ago, 20 percent increase in net card fees. OK, MX saying fee based cards accounted for more than 70 percent of all new accounts added in the quarter. Now, there's population growth. There's people coming to the age that they are graduating college, they're in college, right? They're becoming men and women, they're getting credit cards. That's always going to be a flow in the market.  You probably have a credit card you're using. Hopefully you're paying it off on a monthly basis. The only reason it actually makes sense is maybe you're taking advantage of some type of fee based card where you plan on taking advantage of the kickbacks that they associate with that card. Overusing cash or another card, right? I use a capital one venture.  Two percent back on everything. And I think I pay seventy five dollars a year. It also has some other great features that go with it. There's my personal plug for a capital one venture. If you're outside of the country, great deals on foreign exchange rates as well, I was just in my air cut. I used my credit card the whole time. They'd asked me if I wanted to pay in dollars or in Swiss ranks. And I always wanted to pay in Swiss ranks because capital one was going to give me a better conversion rate than the local airport was probably going to give you on a retail sales spectrum. Beyond that, though, American Express, boy, I've looked at them. They got some big cards.  The platinum card, six hundred and ninety five dollar annual fee. You know, we're going to pull up the perks on this afterwards, because I mean, you use all the the the gifts they give you there. Yeah, you're making that six ninety five back, but you better believe you got to use a lot of them to get it back now. They talk about that that's what MX has been investing in. But they're even jacking the prices on the business gold card to three seventy five from two ninety five. So they got some big fees, man. But guess what? Even on that, sounds like the conference call isn't going that well. You're dropping from one forty nine to one forty seven right now. You were almost flat on those numbers. MX going to open down a couple of dollars to one forty seven. It's going to be an interesting Friday in the markets. Don't go away, folks. We're coming back for the opening bell. Stay tuned. We got a lot more to talk about. 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From the moment the market opens until the closing bell sounds, Tiger TV has eight different shows with expert hosts to help you make the right moves with your money. Watch online at TFNN.com or on TFNN's YouTube channel and become the investor you were born to be, TFNN Educating Investors. Don't forget, you can listen to TFNN live on your mobile device 24 hours per day. Go to TFNN.com and hit Watch Tiger TV. That's TFNN.com and hit Watch Tiger TV. Welcome back, folks. We've got markets open. You've got the S&P down just seven points right now. You're trading at $42.95, saving itself a bit. We were coming in at $42.82. Let's just get ready for the program. 8.30 in the morning this morning, right? Coming down to the lows at 3 in the morning. Market saves itself a bit, but we're just back up to $42.96. You've got a high of $43.04. $43.04 was the high just prior to 5 in the morning. Yeah, and we back things up. I mean, we're just coming into the close of yesterday, and that was an area you chopped around in. Below $43.10 since about $245 in the afternoon. So if you're looking for an upside area, maybe, you've got $43.04 for the overnight high back from 5 a.m. You've got the area of about $43.10, which is where you faced a little bit of resistance yesterday in the close. And then you're pumping up against basically $43.20, which was the 11 o'clock coming into Chairman Powell and that first spike lower as well with the markets down by nine points. We'll see, though, tough to find a bit in this market right now with a lot of weight when it comes to yields. You jump over to the 10-year, a slight reprieve from where we were. The 10-year easing off that 5% yield mark were up by 13 ticks right now at $105.26. All right, we got a couple of questions in the Tigers then on YouTube for our man, Peter. And we're looking at Svix. And this is the short VIX. Let's jump over to this one for a moment. So now this is Svix. It's the one times, so a one-to-one, VIX short futures ETF. Let me say that again, a one times, negative one times short VIX futures ETF. So what you're gonna have here is you're gonna have an inverse relationship to the VIX. Okay, your short VIX. The VIX is just spiked from 12.68 up to 21.15 this morning. You jump over to the Svix, the short VIX. We've just dropped from 33.53 to 23.54. You can see the run-up this thing has as volatility got sucked out of this market when the market just traded in positive territory. Now, look at it, that's in March, right? Go over to the VIX. March, the VIX was spiking at 30, okay? And we paired all the way down to 14. So you see how this thing moves? It moves inverse. We're looking for a potential buy for the VIX. Now, the short VIX, okay? Peter's question is downside targets for entry, okay? So if you're looking at the Svix, you gotta jump over to the VIX. And really, what it means is you would be looking for an area too short, the VIX at highs, right? While we're 21.18 right now, okay? The only thing I'll say is this is not too outlandish for how things usually get out of whack, right? You compare it to any time prior to the pandemic, man. You're looking for spikes in this. Doesn't mean it's gonna happen, okay? But I mean, we just ripped lower to the tune of 270 points in the last five weeks, more than a 5% acceleration. You cherry pick the high of 46.34. We're talking about 340 points, 6 or 7% off the top of that market, right? Yeah, yeah, just like that, off that recent high. Point being, we're only at 21 right now.  And if we pull back to that 4,200 range, Peter, you're gonna see the VIX spike potentially even more. You know, maybe we come in through this week and the market gets ahead of a Fed positioning for higher for longer, but I don't think I'm comfortable shorting the VIX at 21 right here, okay? Even earlier in the year at that initial spike, we got up to 30. I don't think I'm comfortable shorting the VIX. Now, we're in a new normal, okay? We are in a new normal in terms of it's not like the pandemic. It's not like the Fed is going on a hiking cycle 11 times more to five and a quarter percent to 5.5, okay? We're through that volatility, but I'm just not comfortable making that trade. So if you're looking for the short VIX, I would be looking for more of a pullback, man. And maybe you're looking for a pullback down to like 20 bucks or something like that. There's 23.70, maybe you let it test even the highs of that area of $19 coming in to where you were prior to that real drop off. Not sure you're getting back to 12.50 because that would be quite a pullback in this market with quite a VIX spike, but not really quite comfortable just yet. And Uber, looking for an entry in Uber, this thing's been quite a run, all right? You had a downturn channel, you break out of that at the beginning of the year. Let's take those off there because you could easily make the case that you're in a nice little upturn channel, man. Even from the beginning of this year, let's draw a couple of lines on here. Maybe something like this. It's an art, not a science, folks. But you can see that parallel range that it's been chopping around in. You take the highs it had late last year, you take the high it had early this year, it bumps up against. We're bumping into an area right now potentially. Maybe I looked to 37.50, which is testing kind of that high that it had back in the beginning of the year. Peter, the highs talking about 37.58. I mean, tough getting him when you just went from 25 to 42 on this equity, but I've talked about it myself. I would much rather be in an equity like Uber when it comes to the gig economy versus an equity like Instacart versus an equity like Dash. Now, Uber has Uber Eats, that's a luxury. But then the necessity of the car rides, they've changed the world forever on that front. And I imagine people are never gonna pull back from the money they spend on let's take an Uber, let's Uber to the bar. I often said earlier, the name of that company is now a verb in the US language. That doesn't happen often. Nobody says let's lift to the party. No, they say let's Uber to the party, okay? And that's not going away anytime soon. So we've had quite a run on this thing, that's the only worry, but you look at a channel line, man. And maybe that's just bumping up against the bottom line of that. The other thing you could do, Peter, if you're looking at it longer term, you could always scale into this equity. If you're looking to put $5,000 into this equity, well, you could take $1,000 of it and put it into the equity every couple of months over the next 10 months or so and price in over the next 10 months. It's one way to do it because you have had a run from 25 up to 42. But if you're looking for a short-term trade, man, you're bumping up against an area. Maybe you put your stop somewhere below that, 42.93, we're back from 50 bucks. And last thing, let's look at a Fibonacci basis, in terms of this run we've had, because it's pretty much been a one-way trip for this year. And where does that bring it to? Yeah, 40 bucks, which is where you chopped around in May. You got that acceleration on their earnings about six months ago. And let's see when their earnings are. So their earnings are out October 31st for Uber. So keep that on your radar as well. All right, market saving itself a bit. S&Ps just down by five. We jump back to the chart. We jump back to a 10-minute chart. A little bit of a lift on the opening bell. We're up to almost 4,300 in the S&Ps right now. NASDAQ negative by 45. We jump to American Express on their numbers. Saving itself a bit, only off about 1.8% right now. We jump over to the big dogs. Apple, negative by 2.10%. Amazon, quite a day yesterday, right? They gave it up for the session, up to 132. You close out at 128. We're trading right now just in the negative by 7.10% for Amazon shares. You jump over to Microsoft, negative by 3.10%. We take a look at Tesla shares. That's a tough one, off 1.7%. Extending the gains of yesterday. Pretty remarkable, man. Let's check out NVIDIA. NVIDIA, up half a percent, tough week for them as well. All right, folks, S&Ps off by six. Stay tuned. We'll take a look at some of the other equities that have some action on Friday. We'll be right back. You might think that if you want to be successful at trading in the stock market, you're going to need a crystal ball. After all, it's impossible to predict the future, right? Like any endeavor in life, before you decide it's impossible, get some advice from the experts. You might find that it's not so impossible after all. 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And I was talking about the American Express Platinum card. Let's jump to MX before we jump and give them a free commercial. And I do not have this card folks, but it is interesting taking a look at some of these perks if you've never looked at it, if you actually maximize the value of what you're getting here. So this is the American Express Platinum card, annual fee $695, it's quite a price tag. Now I mentioned my credit card, Capital One Venture, I think it's $75 for the year. I get two times rewards on everything. So nice and simple, I used that for purchases when I want to, 2% kickback is what I get. This gives you one times membership rewards points, okay? Except you get five times membership rewards points on eligible prepaid hotels. You get five times membership rewards on flights booked directly with airlines through American Express Travel. What you also get in here, and this is the cool part, so it's quite a business plan what they're doing, right? They're signing people up on $700 yearly recurring payments and they're giving them the basket of goods for that $700. You get a $200 hotel credit. Now remember, you got to make up 700 bucks. We're traders, man, okay? We've just spent 700 bucks. That's like an option premium, where you then have to make up that premium first before you go into the profit, okay? But here's how it goes, you get a $200 hotel credit. Well, a lot of people might spend at least $200, one night a hotel a year, there's your 200, okay? $200 airline fee credit, one qualifying airline and then receive up to $200 in statement credits per year. There's 400, do you use Walmart Plus? Well, guess what? Excuse me, you get Walmart Plus. You receive a statement credit that covers the full cost each month, $155. Now here's where it gets interesting, okay? You subscribe to Netflix, Disney, Hulu, ESPN Plus. Yeah, they'll give you $20 a month, $240. So just there, if you book one hotel room night, one airline, because I've looked at this and I said, you know what? I don't need to spend $700 to have another credit card, okay? But you spend a hotel, 200 bucks. 200 bucks for the airline, there's 400. You use Walmart Plus, there's 555. You throw on your Netflix subscription folks and you're at $800, just like that, right? Uber Cash, Uber Eats and Rides With Uber, $20 a month. Yeah, $200. You wanna use the clear, which is when you're traveling, right? A clear membership, that's 189 bucks. So you can see how it adds up, man. Yeah, we talked about Walmart, we talked about the digital. We talked about, anyway, for what it's worth, then you gain access, of course, to all their clubs, at the airports, et cetera. Yeah, the Centurion lounges, et cetera, but you can see, you know, you put those things in the right basket and of course they want all those goods going through their processing, right? Cause they're getting fees on all that. So you have to make sure your Netflix account, all of it's going through your Amex card. You're paying 700 bucks, but you can get over 1500 bucks in value if you really use it. Equinox, let's see. Equinox Plus, what do you need? Do you need a bike to do that? I don't even know. That's why I kind of was like, ah, I don't really need that. And then the kicker is though, right? Is that they're only giving you one, I mean, imagine you're paying 700 bucks. They're giving you all these values, but they're only giving you a 1% membership reward on everything else. Pretty interesting when I get a 2% reward and a lot of people get one to 2% now for most credit cards. So this is literally just a $700 recurring payment for the luxuries that affords you and for the kickbacks that affords you. It's a pretty interesting business plan when you look at it in that context. And their numbers, yeah, they get some good numbers. Going over those numbers again, man. Net income, $2.45 billion, or a record $3.30 a share. And yeah, the market was only looking for 295, but guess what? American Express, down 2.1%. What have you done for me lately?  They were talking about some of these payment processors yesterday, PayPal. They were talking about them on Fast Market with our man, Kevin Hinks. We don't talk to Kevin on Mondays or Wednesdays, folks. We interview Kevin at 9.15 in the morning, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, but you can check out the program Fast Market from the Schwab network. Every trading day, 12 noon Eastern time right here. They were talking about these three. PayPal off 1.5, and yeah, how about this chart, right? Where is the end for PayPal? No one knows, $54.16. You wanna talk about where is the end, man? Yeah, be careful of these equities, man. Check over, guys. All right, let's look at this, yeah. I mean, look at these ones.  I mean, look at this. Maybe there's a little bit of a rotation. Maybe somebody has finally taken money out of some of these growth stocks and puttin' money into Verizon. I have, kid, but you are up from where you were trading just a few days ago from 30, 64 up a buck, 20, a little bit of a lift, but boy, I would look for more than that. AT&T catches a lift on their earnings, okay? Cause these things have just been a mess to put it lightly. Look at this, five year. You commit to COVID on AT&T at 29, you're at 15. Yeah, you commit to COVID at 60. You're cut in half on Verizon and AT&T from where you were prior to COVID. Remarkable. All right, we get the markets just down by three. Let's check in on the dollar index before we jump around to what else we have going on. Dollar index back in off a bit, 106.15 right now as we're having a little bit of a reprieve in yields. Now, check it out, right? Put this channel on on your tenure, folks. This doesn't mean we have to get right back down there, but you see the action. We are near a range of the lower portion of that channel line, okay? And that's going all the way back to basically where this thing began in May. When you had a price tag of 114 on the lower part of that channel, all the way up to that spike high of 117. Nice round number, 117 is where it began. You just rip lower from 108.16 down to a low of 105.10. So you're talking about three points and six ticks lower. And maybe we get a little bit of a reprieve here. We actually hit, the headlines say we hit 5%. It would make sense you could get a reprieve when the headlines say that we hit 5%, which is remarkable. But just like that, I think we're probably pushing 4.92 right now on the tenure, just that quick. And look at the NASDAQ only down by less than 110% right now, coming into a potential area of support. That area is probably a little lower. That area is supporting the NASDAQ 100. It's probably at around 14,750. And we got to a low this morning, 14,796, so pretty close. And we jump over to the VIX, 2050. So you get a rollover, you get higher prices, Peter. And yeah, you jump over to that S-VIX, right? Yeah, up a bit. You see the type of moves you really need to get some action in this though. You know, sitting at 21, the VIX can jump to a high of 25, 30, like nothing. It can also pull back to 17 or 18, like nothing. And just like that, the Dow and Russell basically flat. We jump to JP Morgan off 810th percent. Morgan Stanley shares slightly in the positive this morning. Tough week for them, Goldman Sachs. Slightly in the more positive after a tough week for them as well. Goldman Sachs up about half a percent. We jump to Wells Fargo shares off 1.2%. City slightly in the red. We jump over to Netflix after their big day on Wednesday into yesterday. And yeah, it's not done yet. Netflix shares up another $6, pushing 410 this morning, trading right now at $407.90. And we jump to gold. We'll talk a little bit of gold when we get back. Gold spiking yet again, 1995. Stay tuned, folks. One more segment, we'll be right back. The gold report. As a precious metal, gold is still king. It continues to hold the most effective safe haven and hedging properties across the global major trading hubs of the London OTC market, the US futures market, and the Shanghai Gold Exchange. The gold report. Tom O'Brien publishes his weekly gold report every Monday morning for subscribers, consisting of coverage of the XAU, HUI, GDX, the Dollar, Bonds, the South African Rand, as well as 25 different mining equities with specific buy-sell recommendations. The gold report. New subscribers get a 30-day money back guarantee so you have nothing to risk. Subscribe to Tom O'Brien's gold report newsletter now at TFNN.com. You might think that if you want to be successful at trading in the stock market, you're going to need a crystal ball. After all, it's impossible to predict the future, right? 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Folks, be careful in this market today of Friday on the heels of what we had going on yesterday right now. And you are talking about options expiration as well, folks. Coming into that number, we have the third Friday of the week, we're up to 42.92, but you saw, we just got to move right now. Let's put it back on a one minute so you can see how quickly that just went, man. Over the period of three minutes, you dropped from 4,300 down to 4,288. Now we're up by six points this market trying to find itself right now. We jump over to the VIX. VIX right now, 20, 64 on a one minute basis. We jump over to that gold contract. Just under the highs we had pre-market, 1997. We're at 1997, 60. There's a new high for you, 1997, 90. We just got $2 away from 2000. We'll probably hit that number, right? Our man Vassal Chapman coming up next, those nice round numbers and we're sitting at 1996. As I mentioned, folks, the gold report. If you haven't checked it out, even if you have before, come on over to the front page of TFNN, check out the gold report. It comes out every Monday morning. My dad's got new issues. He's got positions already in there. But if this is the run, and it looks like it's got some legs here, okay? Then it's probably not gonna be done at 2000, but get his insights, get his expert advice and get some of those traits that he's out there putting in his newsletter every week. New issues out Monday and you gain access, folks, to the archives and you gain access to the archive webinars that he has in there as well. So you don't need to wait till Monday. Sign up, go over the weekend. No better time to check out some gold ran with gold rocking right now at 1997. We jump over to yields, slight reprieve in yields. So we'll see. We've been talking about the channel line. We'll see if it holds right now. We're catching a little bit of a bid near the bottom portion of that channel line. We jump over to American Express on their numbers. I mean, tough to be a public company, man, because they crush it, record profits, they're growing dramatically and the stock's down 3%. You're off $4.55 for American Express shares so far this morning. With the S&Ps pushing those session lows, $42.91. Folks, thanks so much for starting your Friday off right here with me. Stay tuned. We got Basil Chapman coming up next with the Tiger Technicians Hour. We've got our man Steve Rhodes with the Trader's Edge live after that. Fast Market at 12 from the Schwab network, with Kevin Hicks and Tom White, our man Larry Pezzavento live at one o'clock and Tom O'Brien, my dad. He's back live from three till four to wrap up the trading week. S&Ps off by 12. Stay tuned for Basil, folks. Have a great one.