I think the shares have gotten a bit ahead of themselves for now, but it is a promising company. I appreciate your article on it. Let's see what news and scientific progress they make to see if they can move up from here.

Tearing down the bitcoin structure is not most governments attempt. What they are fighting against is the illicit use of crypto as with other forms of monetary exchange that violate sanctions (S. Korea), cut holes in foreign exchange policies (China), avoid taxes (US and European countries), or support criminal and illegal things. These things have to be addressed. The sooner they are resolved the better for everyone. You can't just shrug your shoulders as N. Korea uses crypto to funnel money to building nuclear weapons and missiles to threaten the US. That is the main why South Korea is desperate to stop the illicit flow until it is fixed along with the suspicion N. Korea is amassing a stockpile to potentially attack their economy if it becomes too big and influential in their economy.

The issue is despite any talk the US dollar has been on a noticable slide recently and the bigger national debt doesn't help. If inflation rises without a decent response by the Federal Reserve the dollar will remain under pressure. It is not just the government that is causing a weak dollar, but the central cause remains the US central bank.

This looks unusual but is a function of money flow. Money that has been driving this market is money which was going into bonds but is no longer doing so. That money is a very large purse with few places to run to. The market will keep going up until it's unsustainable. My only beef is that so many people playing the market are making the common mistake of buying yesterdays winners and leaving the laggards behind which now are much better valued than the high flying winners.

The issue is that the laggards are safer especially in a downturn, but will not necessarily rise as fast as the super hyped stocks in this bull market.

Clearly fear of losing out has taken the upper hand. My suggestion for late entries such as the writer is, if you are getting in this late, to shop for lagging stocks which are only being suppressed because many investors can't handle owning anything but rockets anymore and are dumping anything else without regard to fundamentals.

Amazon is just a good focus point to the change of behavior of consumers. Online has grown, but is not just Amazon, and price shopping has also grown and matured. One thing that is also changing is the rise and growth of super stores. Small retailers will continue to get their lunch eaten by big retailers with pricing advantages.

Even if a deal is put in place there is little hope for any resolution to make any consensus deal for a budget. If I recall directly the only reason a budget problem didn't occur sooner was a Donald deal to help the dreamers out which materialized to be nothing. I doubt the Democrats will take his word again and the Republicans are in no mood to give in since Trump has little control of his party either.

The good news is that the shutdown's effect can be mitigated for some time if the President chooses to do so.

Sadly this is worse for the Japanese economy than the US right now.

It is certainly worth watching the players as interest rates rise and if the dollar falls further. Nothing is imminent and there is not a crisis yet, however, it should be a concern. There aren't that many giant buyers who can munch the amount of debt the US is pouring on. It is dangerous to make that amount larger and the US budget as is will likely end up forcing cuts in later years that won't be that palatable.

You could force social media to disclose where articles and advertising comes from and who is paying for it. You could also bar them from accepting money from outside countries for any posts inside any country since the whole thing seems to be being caused by worries foreign countries are misusing social media to influence elections, etc. Sadly, this would also work against democratic pushes in undemocratic countries.