[ZeroHedge] Arabica coffee futures have soared over the past six weeks, reaching their highest level since February as traders closely monitor tightening supplies, adverse weather conditions in Brazil and other top growers, and uncertainty surrounding upcoming harvests, which has fueled a short squeeze.
Arabica, the premium bean used by Starbucks, Dunkin', and other chains, jumped as much as 6.2% to $4.21 on Monday, with momentum easing on Tuesday as $4.20 emerged as a line of resistance. Notably, futures have surged nearly 50% since early August.
In a mid-August report, we cited Maja Wallengren, Danish-born independent coffee market reporter and founder of SpillingTheBean, who warned that adverse weather across key coffee-producing areas in Brazil, including the entire Cerrado Mineiro region and parts of Southern Minas, had experienced "frost damage" severe enough to be a potential "death blow" to the 2026 harvest.
Wallengren recently warned that "multiple and continuing weather disasters across the world's Arabica and Robusta producing countries" are producing an extreme situation where "there is ZERO POSSIBILTY for global production to recover until 2030 and it's a FACT that The World IS Running Out of Coffee !!"
In robusta markets...
*BREAKING MARKET ANALYSIS #KC: World #Coffee Prices To Hit 10-Year Bull Cycle as Brazil Disaster Continues to Worsen, Making it IMPOSSIBLE for the Global Supply Chain to recover until 2030 earliest !!
*Aug. 18, 2025 (SpillingTheBeans)--Those in the global #coffee trade who… pic.twitter.com/LulUj7faq0
— Maja Wallengren (@SpillingTheBean) August 19, 2025
According to Judy Ganes, president of J. Ganes Consulting, the weather in Brazil is dry but not abnormally so. She told Bloomberg that the market is "on anxiety" because of separate weather concerns that may impact bean sizes.
While the latest U.S. Department of Agriculture report forecasts global coffee output at around 178.7 million bags in 2025–26, weather risks remain on analysts' minds. Ganes noted that the rally in coffee futures is being driven more by financial positioning and tariffs than by fundamentals.
"We should be seeing prices coming down unless there is some major issue with the flowering for the Brazilian 26-27 crop, and that story isn't written yet. Even with the couple of cold snaps, you could still wind up with a decent crop," Ganes said, adding, "To me, this is all financial, and it's being tripped up by the tariffs."
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Three officers were killed and two others were left at death's door from an apparent ambush in rural Pennsylvania Wednesday afternoon.
Police were following up on an investigation that had begun the day before when the unidentified gunman opened fire in North Codorus Township. He was then killed when police returned fire.
An initial 911 call came in at 2.10pm, followed by a series of calls, including one that said 'officer down' and 'signal 13,' which means an officer in trouble.
At least 30 shots were fired in the barrage, one witness told WGAL.
'It was just continuous,' Dave Miller said. 'More than what I could count, but it was at least 30 shots and it went on for quite a while.'
Miller said he was heading home from work when he saw police 'looking for someone.
'And then I heard the gunshots ring [out] and I saw people on the ground and I got clear,' he said, describing how he found an officer lying in the middle of the road.
'More police were still rolling and they were coming from all directions,' Miller continued. 'It wasn't long til I heard a helicopter.'
At that point, Miller said, a police officer urged him to get out of the area.
He added that he knew the family who lives at the house, but did not know why police were called to the scene.
The shooting had prompted schools in the Spring Grove School District and hospitals in York County to be temporarily placed on lockdown.
The school district noted that the officer-involved situation was not related to students or schools.
In remarks Wednesday night, Gov. Josh Shapiro denounced the violence as he argued 'we can do better when it comes to mental health.'
'We need to do better as a society,' the governor told news hounds, expressing his hope that something 'constructive' can come from the fallen officer's memory.
'We grieve for the loss of life of three precious souls who served this county, served this commonwealth, served this country,' Shapiro said.
Multiple agencies are now assisting with the investigation, as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the agency is 'monitoring' the situation and echoed Shapiro's remarks that 'violence must stop.'
'We are working with our interagency partners and will share more information as soon as it becomes available. We are praying for the victims and their families. This violence must stop.'
Strangely, the Mexican Consulate also said in a now-deleted post it was 'monitoring the incident' and that the 'Mexican community is advised to follow official instructions.'
A spokesperson for the consulate in Philadelphia has since claimed that the post was 'only a precautionary alert for our community.'
Officials confirmed that the shooter accused of killing three officers and wounding two others in York County, Pennsylvania, was shot and killed by police during the incident.
Sources had initially said that the shooter died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. During a Wednesday evening press conference, however, Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Col. Christopher Paris revealed that the suspect was killed by police.
Officials have not yet revealed the suspect's identity.
Update from the NBC liveblog at 1:45 p.m. EDT:
SEP 17
7:16 PM PDT
Officials with the Pennsylvania State Police said that Wednesday's shooting that left three officers dead and two others hurt, stemmed from them trying to serve a warrant regarding a domestic incident from Tuesday.
"They were there to follow up on an investigation that began yesterday," Cpl. Christopher Paris said. "The general heading of that investigation I would say would be domestic related."
Officials said that they are working on writing up search warrants and could not provide any more information as of Wednesday evening.
[DM] This is the moment a security guard cheats death as he dodges gunfire during a shoot-out after he chased a pair of crooks through a residential street.
In incredible footage, the armed officer can be seen ducking for cover as repeated gunshots hail towards him after he attempted to track down a group of robbers in Umhlanga, a coastal resort town north of Durban in South Africa on Tuesday morning.
He is then attacked at point-blank range by gunmen but remarkably survives, forcing the robbers to flee from the scene of the 'attempted murder'.
The officer had pursued the suspects before pulling over in front of them to prevent them driving off in the quiet street.
He then got out of his car to accost the suspects, who also jump out of their vehicle before launching the attack.
Another car, carrying a man dressed in a balaclava and a bulletproof vest, then shot a rifle at the security officer, who managed to fire back and force them away.
The guard then ran away, calling for back up, as the car speeds off.
Police have since opened an attempted murder case.
The guard, who was with the South African Police Services special forces unit for 12 years and taught their military special forces to shoot – remained remarkably calm under attack.
He told his fellow security guard to cock his automatic rifle and hit the accelerator as his attackers tried to kill him.
The other car full of gunmen then tried from the other side and fired at least 13 shots into the vehicle but the expert marksman and highly trained sniper remained unperturbed.
The chasing cars tried to force him to stop and fired shots into the windscreen. But Mr Prinsloo simply rammed straight into them.
A security friend of his said: 'Leo got fed up with the one-way traffic of bullets and hit the brakes and told his colleague to hand him an automatic rifle, released his seat belt and got out.
'He had enough of being a sitting duck and decided to take the fight to the armed robbers and was not going to go down without a fight. He is an expert shot and wanted to give a little bit back.
'When they saw Leo get out with his automatic rifle in a bullet proof vest and kneeling down to take aim they decided they had had enough and gave it up and the two cars made their escape.
'You can see from the dashcam that from start to finish he hardly bats an eyelid but is constantly aware of where they are and doesn't flinch when they open fire on him and does his job perfectly
[AFRICANEWS] Pretoria's High Court has denied an appeal by the family of late Zambian president Edgar Lungu, who wanted him to be buried in South Africa. According to the court, Lungu should however be buried in his home country.
It was the last resort for Edgar Lungu's family: the High Court in Pretoria however rejected their appeal against a decision to bury the late Zambian president in his home country on Tuesday.
Edgar Lungu, president of Zambia from 2015 to 2021, died in a South African hospital while undergoing treatment in June, aged 68.
His family have been adamant about his burial in South Africa, in an attempt to prevent current Zambian president Hakainde Hichilema, a fierce political rival, from attending or speaking at the funeral.
But the court in South Africa ruled last month that the Zambian government had the right to bury a former president and that it should receive Lungu's remains, which are currently still awaiting burial in a morgue in South Africa.
The family's appeal against this decision has now been rejected, and Lungu's body is expected to be handed over to Zambia.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/18/2025 00:00 ||
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[AFRICANEWS] A top police official who claimed that South Africa's police and justice system has been infiltrated by criminal syndicates took the stand Wednesday at a government-backed probe into the allegations.
KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi said at a news conference in July that some top politicians and police officials were interfering in sensitive police investigations in the interest of criminal syndicates and narco mobs. His claims caused a public outcry and led to the commission of inquiry being appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
South Africa's parliament has been separately investigating Mkhwanazi's claims.
South Africa has one of the highest crime rates in the world and allegations of corruption within the police are not new. However,
man does not live by words alone, despite the fact that sometimes he has to eat them... it is unusual for high-ranking police officials to accuse each other of involvement with criminals.
During his opening statement on Wednesday, Mkhwanazi said he would show the extent of the threat to the country's criminal justice system.
''It has been my aim that I want to demonstrate that the criminal justice system has been subject to a continuous threat, as well as sabotage, which has been with us over an extended period," he said. ''To a point where we believe it is at real risk of total collapse if nothing is done."
Posted by: Fred ||
09/18/2025 00:00 ||
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[BBC] Major US tech firms have pledged tens of billions of pounds worth of investment in the UK, with Nvidia Jensen Huang, predicting the country will become an "AI superpower".
The biggest single investment comes from Microsoft, which has announced a $30bn (£22bn) spending package - its largest ever outside the US.
It is part of a £31bn agreement, dubbed the "Tech Prosperity Deal", between the UK government and several US tech giants as part of President Donald Trump's second state visit to the UK.
"This is the week that I declare the UK will be an AI superpower," Mr Huang told BBC News.
He said the UK had the expertise and research facilities to excel in AI, but "what's missing is the AI infrastructure," adding: "We are here to build it."
AI relies on large banks of servers, run on computer chips like those made by Nvidia, to operate.
Nvidia is partnering with British infrastructure company Nscale to build more such data centres in the UK, and Mr Huang said he had aspirations of "building an AI infrastructure company here in the UK, and then helping it scale out globally."
Meanwhile, Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella said he expected AI investment to drive UK growth and productivity.
"It may happen faster, so our hope is not 10 years but maybe five," he told the BBC.
"Whenever anyone gets excited about AI, I want to see it ultimately in the economic growth and the GDP growth."
The United States continues using regional Asian allies to counter-signal China and flex its military might, following President Xi Jinping's massive military parade marking the 80th anniversary of World War II, which gripped the world's attention two weeks ago.
This week the US Army has unveiled a midrange Typhon missile system on a Japanese base for the first time. The deployment comes in the context of the annual bilateral exercise Resolute Dragon; however, US officials have made clear the Typhon won't be fired, but is only there for training purposes. the Typhon won't be fired, but is only there for training purposes unless the Chinese get squirrelly
We previewed earlier that the Typhon, also dubbed 'Mid-Range Capability', is a land-based missile launcher that can fire nuclear-capable Tomahawk missiles, which have a range exceeding 1,000 miles, and SM-6 missiles, which can hit targets up to 290 miles away.
The missile system would have been banned under the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, a treaty with Russia that the US withdrew from in 2019. This has naturally caused immense alarm in Beijing, as has Washington's deepening military relationship with Japan.
According to the latest from The Hill on the new military exercises:
More than 19,000 U.S. and Japanese service members are participating in the exercise by rehearsing crisis response and contingency operations, with a focus on controlling and defending key maritime terrain, according to the U.S. Department of Defense.
Delivered last month to the U.S. base in Iwakuni, the missile system is capable of firing the Standard Missile-6 and the Tomahawk cruise missiles. The missile showcase follows its deployment in the Philippines last year. Russia and China criticized the U.S., accusing the country of fueling an arms race.
Col. Wade Germann, commander of the task force that operates the missile system, said at a televised press briefing in Japan that "Integrating this system into Resolute Dragon affords us the opportunity to conduct tough and realistic training with our partners."
"Through employing multiple systems and different types of munitions, it is able to create dilemmas for the enemy," he added. Beijing can't help but assume it is the presumed "enemy" being talked about here.
On Tuesday, an alarmed and incensed Chinese Foreign Ministry urged the Typhon systems' immediately removal from Japan.
#3
Less of a message for China, more of a message for NorKs.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
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Each launcher has a potential four missiles, which may be SM-6 antiaircraft missiles, or cruise missiles... as antisurface missiles, the SM-6 are relatively short range, and expensive.
[Yahoo] Two flying cars have collided during an air show rehearsal in China designed as a showcase for the technology.
After the mid-air crash, one of the vehicles fell to the ground and caught fire on impact, with reports that a pilot was injured.
Footage circulating on Chinese state-run media showed the two futuristic vehicles performing air stunts in close formation. The video then cuts to a fire engulfing the wreckage of one of the vehicles as ambulances race to the scene.
The accident occurred on Tuesday in Changchun, in the northeastern province of Jilin, as the city geared up for a five-day air show to begin Friday.
The flying cars, also known as electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicles, were developed by Xpeng AeroHT, one of the largest flying car companies in Asia and a subsidiary of Chinese electric vehicle (EV) giant Xpeng.
The company blamed the collision on “insufficient spacing” and said an investigation was ongoing. I'm sure your Flying Car Collision Insurance doesn't cover “insufficient spacing” without more explanation
[Regnum] One of the largest asteroids will pass by Earth in 2025 at a distance slightly greater than the diameter of the lunar orbit. This was reported on Wednesday, September 17, by the press service of the Solar Astronomy Laboratory of the Space Research Institute (IKI) of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
"One of the largest asteroids of the year, 2025 FA22, will pass tomorrow, September 18, at a distance slightly greater than the diameter of the lunar orbit from Earth, approaching the planet at its closest point around 10:00 Moscow time, " the laboratory's website states.
According to scientists, the average size of the celestial body is 166 meters, 290 meters in length, and its mass is approximately 1,000 times greater than that of the Chelyabinsk meteorite. The probability of this asteroid colliding with Earth is estimated at a negligible fraction of a percent, and currently the chances of such an eventuality are zero, as the celestial body's trajectory guarantees it will miss both the Earth and the Moon.
The laboratory clarified that this asteroid could be the largest to fly past Earth at a distance of less than 1 million km in 2025, despite the fact that meteorites of such size have never fallen on the planet in modern human history.
"All the historical impacts we've heard about involve bodies much smaller. The most famous meteorite crater in history, the Arizona impact crater, is the impact of an asteroid with a mass approximately 10 to 100 times smaller," the scientists noted, adding that the asteroid's transit would be virtually impossible to observe with amateur skywatchers.
[SKYBORNETECH] Skyborne Technologies has successfully completed its first US Department of Defense contract for the US Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory (MCWL). The six-month contract was completed on time and demonstrated in Australia to MCWL’s Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Branch.
The project developed the "Slew-to-Cue" feature, a semi-autonomous targeting assistance using aided target recognition (AiTR), for Skyborne’s Cerberus, a man-portable armed Unmanned Aircraft System delivering organic strike capability at the tactical level. This capability significantly enhances accuracy and reduces operator input to effectively hit targets with a stand off distance. Skyborne’s partner company, Athena AI, delivered the AI target recognition software to provide target and tracking information onboard the Cerberus UAS edge processor.
Skyborne Technologies Chief Executive Officer Dr. Michael Creagh commented, "I think we surprised ourselves at the level of improvement the AiTR gives the Cerberus strike system. What started as a ’nice-to-have' concept has essentially become the core of the entire targeting process. Everyone was speechless when the first shot in the demonstration hit dead centre of the target. We’ve been incredibly impressed with the USMC and MCWL throughout the project. They are forward leaning to get their warfighters the best competitive advantage that they can."
"The project has demonstrated the Cerberus is not only a new class of small armed UAS, but an AI-enabled platform capable of delivering precision fires from a greater stand-off distance and therefore out of visual and acoustic detection. The project has demonstrated the step change capability from other concepts like dropping grenades from small UAS and loitering munitions," said Mr Adrian Dudok, Skyborne Technologies Chief Business Officer.
"MCWL’s experimentation with state-of-the-art autonomous systems exemplifies our commitment to harnessing innovative technologies that enhance our tactical capabilities, ensuring our Marines are better equipped, more agile, and always a step ahead on the battlefield," said Major Steven Atkinson, MCWL Robotics and AI Branch Head.
Text taken from the Telegram channel of pithhelmet
Commentary by Russian military journalist is in italics.
[ColonelCassad] Suddenly. Likbez according to the political timetable in Nepal.
Since I don't follow this country at all, like 99% of the population, it was interesting to get acquainted.
Likbez by Nepali political parties:
1. Nepali Congress (88 seats in the parliament out of 275) -- as the name suggests, this is something related to the Indian National Congress. Indeed, the party was founded in 1947 by Nepalese liberals who were in exile in Calcutta. These liberals wanted to modernize a very archaic state system: the country was ruled by a dynasty of hereditary prime ministers, representatives of the largest feudal family of Rana, and the main source of income for the Nepalese economy was the supply of mercenaries to the British-Indian army.
The Nepali Congress concluded an alliance with the completely powerless Nepalese king Tribhuvan. In 1950, the king fled to India, Jawaharlal Nehru held difficult negotiations with members of the Rana family and forced him to hand over power in a good way. The king and congressmen returned to Kathmandu - to build a new Nepal and democracy But soon enough it became clear that the royal family has its own views on the development of the country and the monarch does not want to give a particularly significant role to the parliament.
In 1960, Tribhuvan's son Mahendra staged a coup d'état, arrested Congress Prime Minister Bishweshwar Koirala and restored absolute monarchy. Congress leaders went into exile and returned only at the end of the 1980s, when Mahendra's son Birendra began to gradually restore democracy. But not only they returned, but also
2. Nepalese communists. The Communist Party was founded in the late 1940s. in the Indian emigration -- the same as the Congress. Communists (Nepalese students who studied in Calcutta) welcomed the overthrow of Ran, returned together with congressmen to their families, but the king banned the activities of the Communist Party.
Later, to create a political counterbalance to the Congress, he allowed it, but in 1960 he banned all parties altogether. Communists went into exile. Like many opposition emigrants, they were mainly engaged in internal conflicts. In addition, pro-Moscow and pro-Beijing groups appeared. As a result, by the time of the restoration of parliamentary democracy, there were several dozen communist parties accusing each other of misinterpreting Marxist teachings.
The following groups are of interest to us:
2a) Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist Party) (76 seats in parliament) -- was assembled in the early 1990s. from those groups that, in principle, were ready to recognize the parliamentary monarchy of King Birendra. During the 1990s KPN (OM-L) successfully fought with the Congress for control of the parliament. But in 2001, the royal family of Nepal experienced (https://t.me/pithhelmet/481) a truly Shakespearean drama, as a result of which King Gyanendra ascended the throne, and the whole country entered a zone of political turbulence. Nepalese Maoists began to gain influence
2b) Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Center) (32 seats in parliament) -- in the mid-1990s. began an armed struggle against the royal power. They initially advocated for the republic, by the mid-2000s. concluded an alliance with the Communist Party of Ukraine (OM-L) and the Congress, which were extremely dissatisfied with Gyanendra's policy. In 2008, the country was declared a republic, the Maoists won the elections.
From 2008 to the present day, two communist parties and the Congress have dominated the parliament of Nepal
Let's see how the early elections announced by the military will affect these decades-long scandals.As usual, ordinary Nepalese will pay for the restoration of the destroyed administrative center of the country. And without that, the poor country suffered damage of hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars.
The structure itself with Maoists and liberals certainly does not look very stable.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
