Welcome to The Free Press Report’s Weekly Digest. This week a lot has happened – China threatened to shoot down a U.S plane, protesters stormed the Iraqi government, and Kentucky declared a state of emergency after flooding. Read on for more of the stories you might have missed.
Market Recap

U.S. Politics
Former congressman arrested for insider trading. Stephen Buyer, formerly the Republican representative for Indiana, is accused of using his position as a consultant for T-Mobile to exploit non-public information. Buyer purchased 112,675 shares of telecommunications company Sprint in 2018, using four different brokerage accounts. Soon after, Sprint announced that it was merging with T-Mobile US. He allegedly found out about the deal while playing golf with T-Mobile executives. Prosecutors claim he profited $126,000 from the trades. He allegedly repeated the scheme the following year, buying shares in Navigant Consulting Inc after discovering it would be acquired by Guidehouse, this time profiting $223,000. Buyer faces four counts of securities fraud and related civil charges. [Reuters]
Biden offers to swap Russian “Merchant of Death” for two Americans. Viktor Bout, the prolific Russian arms dealer who sold weapons to Marxists in Angola and insurgents in Yugoslavia, was arrested in Thailand in 2008 by Thai police working with American authorities and Interpol. He was extradited to the U.S and sentenced to 25 years imprisonment for conspiracy to kill U.S citizens and providing aid to terrorists. Now, Biden has offered to send Bout back to Russia in exchange for Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan. Griner is a professional basketball player who allegedly smuggled weed into Russia. Whelan is a former marine who was imprisoned in Russia on seemingly trumped-up charges on spying. [WFB]
Chinese spies tried to infiltrate Federal Reserve, report finds. Communist agents attempted to bribe employees for access to U.S economic data, and in one case, threatened to arrest a Fed economist who traveled to Shanghai unless he revealed U.S trade policy. Republicans say that the Fed was “unable to counter this threat effectively”, while Jerome Powell described the report as “unfair”. [Axios]
Inflation Reduction Act won’t reduce inflation, Penn Wharton researchers find. The legislation, which forms a key part of Biden’s economic agenda, would provide funds for clean energy and expand the affordable care act, while levying new taxes on companies. The researchers – who are popular with swing-vote senator and inflation hawk Joe Manchin – found that the plan’s impact on inflation would be “statistically indistinguishable from zero.” [BBG]
“I think it is okay too to shoot down Pelosi's plane” tweets Chinese commentator Hu Xijin. Ahead of the House Speaker’s potential visit to Taiwan, Beijing has been ramping up anti-Western rhetoric. Hu, a former state newspaper editor, urged the communist government to deploy fighter jets of the democratically governed island of Taiwan. In response, Twitter locked Hu’s account and made him delete the tweet. [Reuters]
Social and Business
25 dead in Kentucky floods after unprecedented torrential rain. Kentucky’s steep hills and narrow valleys make it particularly vulnerable to flooding, but experts are blaming global warming for the rain, which measured between 5 to 10 inches on Wednesday and Thursday. Governor Andy Beshear said that emergency forces were in “search and rescue mode,” and warned that the death count was likely to continue rising. [Reuters]
West Virginia boycotts banks who boycott fossil fuels. State treasurer Riley Moore determined that companies including Blackrock, JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs are ineligible for state banking contracts due to their divestment of fossil fuels. “All we want is for banks to act like banks,” Moore commented. The coal mining industry employs 11,000 people in West Virginia. [WFB]
World View
Shi’ite protesters storm Baghdad twice in one week, after outrage at government corruption. Populist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr lead thousands of demonstrators to break into Iraq’s fortified “green zone”, breaking into parliament. Hundreds of protesters were wounded after police forces retaliated with teargas and stun grenades. [Reuters]
Pope Francis condemns Canadian genocide and begs “forgiveness”. From 1881 and 1996, over 150,000 indigenous children were taken from their families and forced to attend church-run residential schools, where they were beaten, deprived of food, and sexually assaulted. The pope made his apology while flying back to the Vatican after a week long trip to Canada. When asked by an indigenous reporter why he did not use the word genocide during his trip, the pope replied “I didn't think of it.” [Reuters]
$30 billion Australian warship project has “teething problems”. Four years ago, British company BAE was commissioned to design and produce nine Hunter class frigates for the Australian navy, which were expected to enter service in 2030. But amidst concerns over delays, the head of the British armed forces admitted that the design of the ships was being held back by technical issues. [BBG]
Crypto
Finland sells seized bitcoin worth $47 million with funds going to Ukraine. Customs officials acquisition the 1889.1 btc from narcotics traffickers, and has now realized the profits through two brokers, which were not named. Customers services still hold about 90 btc and hundreds of thousands of euros in other cryptocurrencies, which are awaiting liquidation. [Bitcoin.com]
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