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Saturday, June 21, 2025

Israel Strikes Iran's Isfahan Nuclear Facility Amid Escalating Air War

A primary nuclear facility in Iran’s Isfahan province was targeted by an Israeli airstrike, though local authorities have reported no radiation leaks.

Smoke was visible early Saturday morning near a mountainous area in Isfahan city following overnight Israeli strikes on the site, which activated the country's air defense systems, amid continued tit-for-tat strikes between the Islamic Republic and Israel.

This is the second Israeli aerial attack on Isfahan, and as the Trump White House has vowed to not let Iran get a nuclear weapon.

"Within the compound, a centrifuge production facility was also targeted, along with additional military targets of the Iranian regime in the Isfahan area," the IDF said Saturday morning.

"This is what the nuclear facility in Isfahan looks like, which is used to convert uranium, which is the stage that follows the enrichment stage on the way to producing nuclear weapons," said Israeli Army spokesman Avichay Adraee in an online post.

"The air force struck the central facility along with buildings used to produce centrifuges. We continue to strike the Iranian nuclear project," the statement said.

According to more:

Iran’s Fars news agency reported that there was no leakage of hazardous materials from the Isfahan site following the latest strikes.
Meanwhile, four primed ballistic missile launchers were “neutralized” in strikes before a salvo was launched at Israel, the military said.

One UN-affiliated war monitor has alleged the following:

Below is The Wall Street Journal on the significance of the Isfahan site:

The Israeli military has now hit several of Iran’s centrifuge production sites, including at Isfahan, Tehran and Karaj. While this represents a blow to Iran’s centrifuge production, questions remain over its uranium stockpile.
Iran's large stockpile of enriched uranium was held in or around Isfahan. Safeguarding that stockpile, which has enough highly enriched uranium for around 10 nuclear weapons, would be crucial for any Iranian attempt to rush toward building a bomb. Tehran hinted last month it might disperse that material, which is held in barrels sealed by the International Atomic Energy Agency and regularly inspected. It isn't known if Iran did so.

And here is Financial Times on Saturday after the Isfahan strike:

The Israeli military said on Saturday that it had launched an overnight assault involving 50 warplanes, with some targeting two centrifuge production facilities at Isfahan.
However, the crown jewel of the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program, a sprawling uranium enrichment facility built deep under a mountain in Fordow, remains out of reach of Israel’s conventional weapons.

There are also emerging Saturday reports that Iran has killed another Iranian nuclear scientist:

As Israeli jets struck military targets, high-ranking officers and nuclear-related facilities in Iran during the opening salvo of Operation Rising Lion, there was another extremely high-stakes clandestine mission taking place. Code-named Operation Narnia, Israeli operatives reportedly used a “secret weapon” to simultaneously kill nine of Iran’s top nuclear scientists as they slept in their beds, according to Israel’s N12 news outlet. It was the latest move in Israel’s long-time effort to blunt Iranian nuclear ambitions by killing off the people capable of advancing the program.
Officials declined to say what this special weapon, “which remains under censorship and has not been disclosed publicly,” was, the Times of Israel explained. The War Zone cannot verify these claims. However, as we have previously reported, Israel hit residences of high-value individuals with smaller munitions and Mossad used drones and anti-tank guided missiles inside Iran (more on those later) on the first night of its attack. These targeted assassinations continue today, although not in the same volume seen during the opening acts of the war. It remains possible that some of these systems were used in the assassination of the scientists.
After testifying before the Senate weeks ago that Iran is not actively pursuing a nuclear bomb, Gabbard has since said US intelligence showed Iran is "at the point that it can produce a nuclear weapon within weeks to months."

Meanwhile, the head of the leading intergovernmental watchdog for nuclear energy and atomic weapons, IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi, has said that it is possible that there are operations being kept secret from nuclear monitors.

But at the same time, the United States' own intelligence community has indicated the Islamic Republic is not seeking a nuke. The BBC reports in response to some of DNI Tulsi Gabbard's latest comments:

Disagreement has been building within Trump's "America First" movement over whether the US should enter the conflict.
On Saturday morning, Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said his country was "absolutely ready for a negotiated solution" on their nuclear programme but that Iran "cannot go through negotiations with the US when our people are under bombardment."

"President Trump has been clear that can't happen, and I agree," she added in a new public statement. Trump has said he will make a decision on striking Iran within 'two weeks' - but there remain many variables, no the least of which has been a perceived public rift between DNI Gabbard and the White House.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/israel-strikes-irans-isfahan-nuclear-facility-amid-escalating-air-war

Electricity prices are surging for U.S. households

Electricity prices are rising quickly for U.S. households, even as overall inflation has cooled.

Electricity prices rose 4.5% in the past year, according to the consumer price index for May 2025 — nearly double the inflation rate for all goods and services.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimated in May that retail electricity prices would outpace inflation through 2026. Prices have already risen faster than the broad inflation rate since 2022, it said.

“It’s a pretty simple story: It’s a story of supply and demand,” said David Hill, executive vice president of energy at the Bipartisan Policy Center and former general counsel at the U.S. Energy Department.

There are many contributing factors, economists and energy experts said.

At a high level, the growth in electricity demand and deactivation of power-generating facilities are outstripping the pace at which new electricity generation is being added to the electric grid, Hill said.

Prices are regional

U.S. consumers spent an average of about $1,760 on electricity in 2023, according to the EIA, which cited federal data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Of course, cost can vary widely based on where consumers live and their electricity consumption. The average U.S. household paid about 17 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity in March 2025 — but ranged from a low of about 11 cents per kWh in North Dakota to about 41 cents per kWh in Hawaii, according to EIA data.

Households in certain geographies will see their electric bills rise faster than those in others, experts said.

Residential electricity prices in the Pacific, Middle Atlantic and New England regions — areas where consumers already pay much more per kilowatt-hour for electricity — could increase more than the national average, according to the EIA.

“Electricity prices are regionally determined, not globally determined like oil prices,” said Joe Seydl, a senior markets economist at J.P. Morgan Private Bank.

The EIA expects average retail electricity prices to increase 13% from 2022 through 2025.

That means the average household’s annual electricity bill could rise about $219 in 2025 relative to 2022, to about $1,902 from $1,683, according to a CNBC analysis of federal data. That assumes their usage is unchanged.

But prices for Pacific area households will rise 26% over that period, to more than 21 cents per kilowatt-hour, EIA estimates. Meanwhile, households in the West North Central region will see prices increase 8% in that period, to almost 11 cents per kWh.

However, certain electricity trends are happening nationwide, not just regionally, experts said.

Data centers are ‘energy hungry’

Electricity demand growth was “minimal” in recent decades due to increases in energy efficiency, according to Jennifer Curran, senior vice president of planning and operations at Midcontinent Independent System Operator, who testified at a House energy hearing in March. (MISO, a regional electric-grid operator, serves 45 million people across 15 states.)

Meanwhile, U.S. “electrification” swelled via use of electronic devices, smart-home products and electric vehicles, Curran said.

Now, demand is poised to surge in coming years, and data centers are a major contributor, experts said.

Data centers are vast warehouses of computer servers and other IT equipment that power cloud computing, artificial intelligence and other tech applications.

Data center electricity use tripled to 176 Terawatt-hours in the decade through 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Department. Use is projected to double or triple by 2028, the agency said.

Data centers are expected to consume up to 12% of total U.S. electricity by 2028, up from 4.4% in 2023, the Energy Department said.

They’re “energy hungry,” Curran said. Demand growth has been “unexpected” and largely due to support for artificial intelligence, she said.

The U.S. economy is set to consume more electricity in 2030 for processing data than for manufacturing all energy-intensive goods combined, including aluminum, steel, cement and chemicals, according to the International Energy Agency.

Continued electrification among businesses and households is expected to raise electricity demand, too, experts said.

The U.S. has moved away from fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas to reduce planet-warming greenhouse-gas emissions.

For example, more households may use electric vehicles rather than gasoline-powered cars or electric heat pumps versus a gas furnace — which are more efficient technologies but raise overall demand on the electric grid, experts said.

Population growth and cryptocurrency mining, another power-intensive activity, are also contributors, said BPC’s Hill.

As electricity demand is rising, the U.S. is also having problems relative to transmission and distribution of power, said Seydl of J.P. Morgan.

Rising electricity prices are “all about infrastructure at this point,” he said. “The grid is aged.”

For example, transmission line growth is “stuck in a rut” and “way below” Energy Department targets for 2030 and 2035, Michael Cembalest, chairman of market and investment Strategy for J.P. Morgan Asset & Wealth Management, wrote in a March energy report.

Shortages of transformer equipment — which step voltages up and down across the U.S. grid — pose another obstacle, Cembalest wrote. Delivery times are about two to three years, up from about four to six weeks in 2019, he wrote.

“Half of all US transformers are near the end of their useful lives and will need replacing, along with replacements in areas affected by hurricanes, floods and wildfires,” Cembalest wrote.

Transformers and other transmission equipment have experienced the second highest inflation rate among all wholesale goods in the US since 2018, he wrote.

Meanwhile, certain facilities like old fossil-fuel powered plants have been decommissioned and new energy capacity to replace it has been relatively slow to come online, said BPC’s Hill. There has also been inflation in prices for equipment and labor, so it costs more to build facilities, he said.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/21/why-electricity-prices-are-surging-for-us-households.html

'Goldman: Walmart Remains Price Discount Juggernaut'

Cash-strapped consumers are pulling back on spending—particularly on big-ticket items—as economic uncertainty and tariff risks continue to plague outlooks and squeeze household budgets. Goldman's latest grocery pricing survey for June offers a clear framework for value-seeking shoppers: among all major supermarkets, Walmart remains the most competitively priced, especially for perishable goods.

Goldman analysts, led by Leah Jordan, sampled 38 SKUs across dairy, frozen, dry grocery, household-personal care (HPC), and produce of Kroger (KR), Albertsons/Randalls (ACI), Walmart (WMT), Sprouts (SFM), Whole Foods (WFM) and Dollar General (DG) for June.

The biggest takeaway that Jordan found is that Walmart continued to have the "lowest prices" of any supermarket chain:

As highlighted in Exhibit 1, WMT had the lowest prices at -12.6% vs. the group average (widened from -12.2% last month), followed by KR at -4.7% (vs -2.6% last month). WFM had the highest prices in the group at +10.0%, followed by SFM at +9.9%. KR had the highest SKU availability for the products surveyed at 38, followed by WMT at 37.

Grocery Pricing Survey Analysis: Walmart Offering Best Prices

Category Pricing Summary:

Walmart led on price in dairy (-14.0%), frozen (-15.2%), and dry grocery (-11.0%).
Dollar General had the lowest prices in household & personal care (-17.3%).
Kroger was cheapest in produce (-15.4%) but priciest in HPC (+5.6%).

Cash-strapped Consumers Should Avoid:

Whole Foods: highest in dairy (+16.3%) and frozen (+13.8%).
Sprouts: highest in dry grocery (+32.0%) and produce (+10.8%), though SKU availability was limited.

Month-on-month trend

Overall basket: essentially flat versus May; dairy, frozen and HPC down, offset by upticks in dry grocery and produce.
Big movers: KR cut prices in all five categories; SFM raised in three.

Walmart has long dominated as the lowest-priced retailer—even before the onset of tariff wars (read here)—as U.S. grocers have launched a value battle to capture a larger share of budget-conscious consumers.

https://www.zerohedge.com/personal-finance/walmart-remains-price-discount-juggernaut

Adopt AI or Perish

by Adam Sharp

Artificial intelligence is set to bring about a shift similar in magnitude to the two major industrial revolutions.

Here in the U.S., and throughout much of the world, OpenAI remains dominant in the field. Its ChatGPT AI platform has built a commanding lead.

But which company is OpenAI the biggest threat to? Most people would say Google, because ChatGPT has become a better alternative for many of us. It’s far more intelligent and diligent than a traditional search engine.

But OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was recently on a podcast and broke some interesting news.

Apparently Meta, parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is incredibly threatened by the American AI leader. Sam claims the company is now offering key OpenAI employees $100 million signing bonuses to defect. Spending $100 million on a single employee demonstrates just how important this space has become in the world of big tech.

Additionally, it appears that users are increasingly turning to ChatGPT as a Facebook alternative. They use AI as a therapist, friend, confidant, business advisor, teacher, and even, disturbingly, as a sort of life partner.

Here’s a Sam Altman quote from the podcast:

Within Meta, people think of ChatGPT as a Facebook replacement. Because they talk to it, and they like it more [than Facebook].

Doom-scrolling on the internet makes you feel worse. But when people talk about ChatGPT, it makes people like themselves better. It’s helping me accomplish my goals.

He goes on to describe how Facebook and Instagram essentially try to hack your brain into scrolling forever. But he argues that ChatGPT is different. That it augments its users and improves their lives. There’s some truth there, but we also need to remain wary of the power of AI to influence our thoughts and behavior, as we covered here.

Recent developments back up the idea that OpenAI is a threat to social media platforms. Meta has been falling behind in AI, and just spent $14 billion to acquire 49% of Scale AI, a leading AI data and training firm. Scale CEO Alexander Wang will now head up Meta’s AI efforts.

Clearly, this is an existential issue for Meta. The company has spent vast sums of money buying one of the world’s largest clusters of NVIDIA AI chips, yet their efforts so far have failed to be competitive. For now, the company’s social media platforms remain incredibly profitable, but the larger trend is working against them.

There is a lot of hype around AI, and it will likely take more time than some people think to change the world. But make no mistake, it is set to bring about an unprecedented shift.

Meta isn’t the only one feeling the heat. AI has the potential to make or break not just companies, but individual careers as well.

An Evolving Workforce

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy recently sent a memo out to employees about the impact of AI. Here is an excerpt:

As we roll out more generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done. We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs.

It’s hard to know where this nets out over time, but in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company.

The idea of AI replacing humans is not a pleasant one. But it’s simply a reality. One which will impact all of us eventually.

For those who utilize it correctly, AI can give you superpowers. Whether you’re an entrepreneur, employee, or a retired investor, it’s time to start getting familiar with these tools. Those who learn to utilize them well will thrive, and those who don’t risk being left behind.

For example, I use AI every day. Not for writing. Frankly, it’s not very good at that, at least not yet. But the images you see at the top of every article are made using ChatGPT 4o.

AI is also an incredibly useful research tool. I use it to find historical stories to weave into my newsletters. And as an investor, I use it to screen for companies in a particular sector. For example, I discovered Lynas Rare Earths, which we covered last week, by doing research with ChatGPT.

My father, a doctor, has been using it to help diagnose mystery illnesses. And you don’t have to be a medical professional to use AI to enhance your health. Friends of mine have uploaded their lab work and charts and solved long-term health issues. Difficult diagnoses that no doctor, over the course of years, was able to solve.

AI can be an absolutely priceless tool. Of course, it still gets things wrong occasionally, and will “hallucinate” from time to time. So you always need to check the sources and back it up with old-fashioned research. But it’s only going to improve from here.

If you’re still in the workforce, now is the time to adopt these tools. Head on over to ChatGPT.com and start experimenting. Elon Musk’s X.AI is also an excellent tool.

As investors, we must also pay close attention to how the stocks we own are utilizing AI. Are they increasing productivity, or wasting capital? There’s a whole lot of both happening currently.

The companies which correctly utilize AI will see skyrocketing profitability. Revenue-per-employee at the winning firms will soar to unfathomable heights over the next decade.

In the near future we’ll explore companies which are taking full advantage of AI, and which are falling behind. This is going to be a crucial factor for successful investing going forward.

https://dailyreckoning.com/adopt-ai-or-perish/

Alleged Minn. Assassin Says Gov. Tim Walz Wanted Him To Kill Sen. Amy Klobuchar

by Ken Silva vi Headline USA,

The man accused of shooting two Minnesota lawmakers and their spouses reportedly wrote in a letter to the FBI that Gov. Tim Walz also wanted him to assassinate Sen. Amy Klobuchar, according to a bombshell report from the Minnesota Star Tribune. A Walz did not deny the allegation when commenting on the report.

Citing two people familiar with letter’s contents, the Star Tribune reported Friday that Boelter claimed “Gov. Tim Walz instructed him to kill U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar so that Walz could run for the U.S. Senate.”

Boelter does have a loose link to Walz, who ran for Vice President last year on Kamala Harris’s ticket. Boelter was appointed to the workforce development board by then-Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton in 2016 and then reappointed in 2019 by Walz to a four-year term that expired in 2023.

However, the Star Tribune reported that Boelter’s letter reflected the ramblings of a mentally ill man, downplaying the likelihood that what he says about Walz is true.

“The letter is the clearest evidence yet of Boelter’s mindset after the targeted violence against Minnesota politicians last week. It is incoherent, one and a half pages long, confusing and hard to read, according to two people familiar with the letter’s contents,” the newspaper reported. “It includes Boelter alleging he had been trained by the U.S. military off the books, and that Walz, who is not running for Senate, had asked him to kill Klobuchar and others.”

Hennepin County Attorney spokesperson Daniel Borgertpoepping reportedly responded to the letter, saying that “due to the seriousness of the allegations it contains, we will state only that we have seen no evidence that the allegations regarding Governor Walz are based in fact.”

Instead of denying the allegation, a Walz spokesman reportedly gave a rambling non-answer.

“This tragedy continues to be deeply disturbing for all Minnesotans,” said the spokesperson, Teddy Tschann

“Governor Walz is grateful to law enforcement who apprehended the shooter, and he’s grateful to the prosecutors who will ensure justice is swiftly served,” Tschann said.

However, the Star Tribune reported that Boelter’s letter reflected the ramblings of a mentally ill man, downplaying the likelihood that what he says about Walz is true.

“The letter is the clearest evidence yet of Boelter’s mindset after the targeted violence against Minnesota politicians last week. It is incoherent, one and a half pages long, confusing and hard to read, according to two people familiar with the letter’s contents,” the newspaper reported. “It includes Boelter alleging he had been trained by the U.S. military off the books, and that Walz, who is not running for Senate, had asked him to kill Klobuchar and others.”

Instead of denying the allegation, a Walz spokesman reportedly gave a rambling non-answer.

“This tragedy continues to be deeply disturbing for all Minnesotans,” said the spokesperson, Teddy Tschann

“Governor Walz is grateful to law enforcement who apprehended the shooter, and he’s grateful to the prosecutors who will ensure justice is swiftly served,” Tschann said.

Boelter is accused of killing former House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, in their Brooklyn Park home last Saturday, before travelling to also shoot and injure Sen. John Hoffman, also a Democrat, and his wife, Yvette, at their Champlin address about nine miles away. Police responded to reports of gunfire at the Hoffmans’ home shortly after 2 a.m., Champlin police said, and found the lawmaker and his wife, Yvette, with multiple gunshot wounds.

Boelter remained on the lam for over the next 24 hours before he crawled to officers in surrender Sunday after they located him in the woods near his home.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/alleged-minn-assassin-says-gov-tim-walz-wanted-him-kill-sen-amy-klobuchar

6 B-2 Stealth Bombers En Route To Indo-Pacific Ahead Of Trump's Intel Meeting

As the Israel–Iran conflict enters Day 9, President Trump has publicly stated he will wait two weeks before deciding whether to authorize U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear infrastructure. In parallel, U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit stealth bombers are being repositioned to forward operating bases in the Indo-Pacific—possibly Andersen Air Force Base in Guam or Diego Garcia in the Chagos Archipelago—indicating a deliberate show of force and strategic signaling of U.S. readiness for multi-theater operations.

Fox News confirmed six B-2 stealth bombers have taken off from Whiteman AFB in Missouri and are likely to be staged at Andersen AFB in Guam.

🚨BREAKING: 6 U.S. B2 stealth bombers appear headed towards Guam
— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 21, 2025

Plus air tankers.

BREAKING: U.S. Air Force B-2 stealth bombers appear to have taken off from their base in Missouri. These are the exact aircraft needed to hit the heavily fortified Iranian Fordow Nuclear Site.

Eight tankers are in flight, headed the same direction, refueling the B-2 bombers… pic.twitter.com/an8Z2xlKJJ
— Hunterbrook (@hntrbrkmedia) June 21, 2025

There is no official confirmation regarding the current force posture or final destination of the stealth bombers. For months, the USAF has staged these nuclear-capable bombers at Diego Garcia (in range of Iran)—often referred to as America's "unsinkable aircraft carrier"—located between Africa and Indonesia, approximately 1,000 miles south of India.

"President Donald Trump, who has said he will make a decision on U.S. involvement in the Israel-Iran conflict, is expected to return to the White House on Saturday afternoon. The president is expected to receive intelligence briefings with the National Security Council on Saturday and Sunday as he considers possible actions against Iran," Fox News noted.

The island provides strategic access for stealth bombers to the Middle East, Central and South Asia, and across the Indian Ocean.

Previous staging of B-2s at Diego Garcia:

Staging B-2s at Guam or Diego Garcia is a clear signal of deterrence to adversaries, whether that's Iran in the Middle East or China and North Korea in Asia. The mere presence of these stealth bombers can be both preemptive and psychological.

More force posture: This week, the USAF has repositioned additional fighter aircraft and aerial refueling tankers across key regional bases in Europe, coinciding with Israel's Operation Rising Lion targeting Iranian assets. The moves come amid growing speculation that President Trump may authorize direct U.S. military involvement within the next two weeks unless Tehran makes a deal with the U.S.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/force-posturing-six-b-2-stealth-bombers-en-route-indo-pacific-ahead-trumps-intel