Hektor

I would love to hear what our bond people think about this? The gist is “there is nothing stopping the treasury department from saying that we’re are extending the maturity date of your bond to a future day-month-year”

Travel, particularly to foreign places.

https://www.wsj.com/business/consulting-firms-offer-up-to-a-combined-20-billion-in-savings-to-federal-contracts-50dd325b Consulting Firms Offer to Cut Up to $20 Billion From Federal Contracts Consulting Firms are negotiating with General Services Administration as part of broad review of government contractors Some of the biggest U.S. consulting firms have offered billions in additional cuts to their contracts after the Trump administration told firms that they needed to pony up deeper price concessions—or face consequences. Seven of the 10 largest consulting firms to the government have now offered up to $20 billion in savings by proposing to either terminate existing contracts or reduce the scope of their work within federal agencies, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. Some firms are now proposing to offer credits toward their work or artificial-intelligence services free of charge. While companies met a deadline last month to identify potential cuts to existing projects, administration officials later told firms that they were unimpressed with the size and scope of the reductions proposed. If firms didn’t offer more meaningful cost savings, Josh Gruenbaum, the GSA’s procurement chief's letter noted, contracts could be terminated and put up for new bids to competitors. Gruenbaum, a former director at private-equity firm KKR, added that the cuts are necessary to “get the nation’s fiscal house in order.” The GSA’s discussions with consulting firms are continuing, according to a person familiar with the discussions, with more meetings with firms scheduled later this week. Gruenbaum, in his statement to the Journal, said the firms provide value to federal agencies, but that the government must change how it does business and “we will do it in partnership with the private sector.”

Ego, may be.

https://www.wsj.com/business/energy-oil/big-oil-is-offshoring-its-prized-engineering-jobs-to-india-2e487fd0 Big Oil Is Offshoring Its Prized Engineering Jobs to India Chevron, BP, others moving work to the country, where engineers are paid salaries about a third or fourth of U.S. counterparts’

Thank you.

@gfp Why buy the ETFs instead of the 20yr US treasuries?

+1

https://www.yahoo.com/news/pentagon-just-killed-5-1-015956256.html The Pentagon says it's ending $5.1 billion worth of IT and consulting contracts with firms including Accenture and Deloitte The US's defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, on Thursday ordered the termination of IT and consulting contracts with companies including Accenture and Deloitte, calling it "wasteful spending." In a Department of Defense memo, Hegseth said he would cut a Defense Health Agency contract "for consulting services from Accenture, Deloitte, Booz Allen, and other firms that can be performed by our civilian workforce." Also on the chopping block is the Air Force's contract with Accenture to "re-sell third-party Enterprise Cloud IT Services," which Hegseth said the government could "already fulfill directly with existing procurement resources." In the memo, Hegseth also said he was terminating 11 other contracts for consulting services supporting what he called "non-essential" activities, including diversity, equity and inclusion, climate matters, and the Pentagon's COVID-19 response. He said the savings would be reallocated to serve "critical priorities to Revive the Warrior Ethos, Rebuild the Military, and Reestablish Deterrence."

Who? Bill A??

E might be the face, but people running the actual show might be real rocket scientists, I suspect.

Save your popcorn cash. More fireworks Better opportunities on the way https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/10/us/trump-news#musk-doge-drops-goal Musk, at a cabinet meeting, appears to drastically reduce DOGE’s goal for cuts. While stumping for Donald J. Trump during the 2024 presidential campaign, Elon Musk said he could cut $2 trillion from the federal budget. After Mr. Trump took office and placed Mr. Musk in charge of the budget-slashing so-called Department of Government Efficiency, Mr. Musk lowered that projection by half, to $1 trillion in the upcoming fiscal year. In a cabinet meeting on Thursday, Mr. Musk appeared to set his group’s goal lower still. “I’m excited to announce that we anticipate savings in ’26 from reduction of waste and fraud by $150 billion,” Mr. Musk told Mr. Trump, referring to the fiscal year, which runs from the beginning of October 2025 to the end of September 2026. In his remarks, Mr. Musk said that he answered someone who asked how he finds fraud in government by saying, “Actually, just go in any direction — that’s how you find it.” He described it as a “target-rich environment.” But the website that Mr. Musk’s group has used to tout its savings has been plagued by errors, including triple-counting the same cancellations and claiming credit for cutting programs that ended under President George W. Bush.

It will become very interesting If China and India could set aside their differences.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-09/hackers-breach-berkshire-hathaway-s-netjets-steal-client-data Hackers Breach Berkshire Hathaway’s NetJets, Steal Client Data Private jet company says the breach didn’t impact operations ‘Limited amount of data’ stolen from company’s ‘owners’ NetJets Inc., a private jet company owned by billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, is investigating a data breach after a hacker stole information about some of its clients, according to two people familiar with the incident and an email seen by Bloomberg News. The attacker successfully “phished” an employee to steal their work account credentials and used that access to steal more information from NetJet’s systems sometime last month, according to one of the people, who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to talk about the breach. A NetJets spokesperson confirmed the breach, saying the company “recently detected and addressed a security incident involving an employee’s account.” “We found that a limited amount of data for a very small number of owners was obtained, and we contacted each of these owners,” the spokesperson said. “The activity did not affect our operations or our ability to service our customers.”

Thanks @Hsmpanl

https://www.ktvu.com/news/elon-musks-brother-kimbal-musk-slams-trumps-tariffs I guess he is speaking for himself

That's a good perspective @rogermunibond

Interesting. Is $40 not the average breakeven across all OXY assets?

Any thoughts about the impact on Poseidon/Atlas from the ongoing trade war?

Hi @Hsmpanl, What is your take on OXY? Their CEO claims that their break even is about $40. Further, most of OXYs reserves seems to be in the USA, apparently a politically stable country. What, if any, differentiates OXY from the others?

JD might be focused on keeping his VP position until he is P

+1. I guess the same might apply to Trump too.