The People’s Bank of China, the country's central bank, has announced that all transactions of crypto-currencies are illegal, effectively banning digital coins. "Virtual currency-related business activities are illegal financial activities," the bank said. It added that cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin and Tether, are not fiat currencies and cannot be circulated. https://oilprice.com/Finance/the-Markets/Is-Chinas-Digital-Yuan-The-Death-Knell-For-Crypto.html

Britain faces a ‘double whammy’ of food-price rises that will squeeze consumers already facing drastic hikes in energy and household bills. David Sables, a food industry veteran who helps suppliers negotiate with big firms, said the first set of price hikes were linked to rising cost of commodities, raw materials and labour in recent months. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/uk-faces-a-double-whammy-of-food-price-rises-that-squeezes-consumers/ar-AAP4LGH

Household electricity bills will rise by 29.8% for the typical family and gas bills will go up by 14.4%, Italy’s energy regulatory authority Arera confirmed. he increase comes amid surging energy costs across Europe, and beyond. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/electricity-bills-italy-rise-almost-30-percent-friday

UK- Food banks have said they will have to shrink the size of the parcels they give to struggling families owing to declining stock levels caused by the HGV crisis, supply shortages and a collapse in public donations. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/oct/04/food-banks-warn-of-smaller-parcels-due-to-hgv-supply-shortages

Russian wheat export prices rose for 12th consecutive week, supported by robust demand and following higher global benchmarks. Russian wheat with 12.5% protein loading from Black Sea ports for supply in the first half of November was $307 a tonne, free on board (FOB), at the end of last week, https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/russian-wheat-up-for-12th-week-amid-higher-global-benchmarks-2021-10-04

UK - Blackpool pig farmer Wayne Baguley, 63, said he has “plenty” of animals, though he warned some may be culled – with their meat wasted – because of bottle-necks elsewhere. "It's not that there's not enough meat in the country, it's the fact that they are not getting it through the system. They may have to start culling pigs if it continues. "If you keep them on the farm too long they can go overweight, and that means they lose sometimes 30 per cent of the value." https://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/business/local-meat-farms-operating-at-50-percent-due-to-labour-shortage-and-lack-of-drivers-3406840

US- The paper was scheduled to be released earlier in the summer but was delayed. It represents the central bank's first concrete step forward in exploring the use of digital currencies in the U.S. economy and could pave the way for a Fed-backed digital dollar. https://www.investopedia.com/fed-to-release-paper-exploring-launch-of-digital-dollar-5204490

The timing of the widespread outages comes as a Facebook whistleblower will be testifying before Congress on Tuesday. The whistleblower appeared on "60 Minutes" Sunday, detailing the tech company's mission to put profit before doing "what was good for the public," including clamping down on hate speech. Shares of the tech company slid 6% by early afternoon, tumbling not just on the whistleblower but also the global outage. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/facebook-instagram-whatsapp-experience-global-outages

Sputnik News-Russia- In late September, an announcement was posted on a hacking forum that claimed to have the name, email, phone number, location, gender, and user ID of 1.5 billion Facebook users. One prospective buyer has allegedly been quoted at $5,000 per 1 million Facebook accounts. This would value the entire set of Facebook user data at $7.5 million. In a subsequent post, the seller alleges to represented a large company that works to scrape Facebook for data. https://sputniknews.com/20211004/data-of-over-15-billion-facebook-users-reportedly-being-sold-on-hacker-forum-amid-worldwide-outage-1089662906.html

Hong Kong’s de facto central bank has taken a “first step” in its exploration of a digital currency, and has sought feedback from academics as well as the finance industry. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) issued a 50-page white paper called “e-HKD: A technical perspective” with the idea of exploring potential architecture and design options for the digital currency. https://www.scmp.com/business/banking-finance/article/3151175/hong-kong-monetary-authority-takes-first-steps-digital

Another week of heavy rains has triggered an outbreak of fungal black pod disease in some of Ivory Coast's cocoa-growing regions, farmers said on Monday, as the marketing season at the world's top producer of the bean kicks off. https://www.esmmagazine.com/supply-chain/rains-fuel-black-pod-outbreak-ivory-coast-cocoa-marketing-begins-148671

European energy prices soared to fresh records amid worsening fears over supply, with U.K. natural gas futures exceeding the threshold of 300 pence a therm for the first time ever. Surging costs are threatening to raise inflation and starting to weigh on industrial production, with some companies in Europe forced to cut output. Concerns over gas storage levels in Europe are building as winter approaches, helping drive prices ever higher. https://ca.news.yahoo.com/europe-gas-power-surge-records-093323557.html

US- Indiana- Johnson Memorial Health Hospital is currently operating under electronic health record downtime procedures, after a cyberattack struck its computer network on Oct. 2. The health system operates a number of primary care sites, specialist offices, and other facilities across three Indiana counties. https://www.scmagazine.com/news/incident-response/cyberattack-drives-johnson-memorial-into-ehr-downtime-procedures

India’s ambitious plan to cut the use of fossil fuels by promoting ethanol derived from rice, corn and sugar is drawing criticism from some experts who warn the move could undermine food security in the world’s second-most populous country. https://www.livemint.com/news/india/why-india-s-ambitious-ethanol-plan-may-spark-food-security-fears-11633477972075.html

A natural gas shortage across Europe has created supply-chain shocks, as seen in the food industry, where problems continue to worsen. European natgas prices are at insane levels, triggering a domino effect of output reduction or closures of fertilizer plants on the continent. Last month, two of the U.K.'s largest fertilizer factories producing 45% of domestic demand closed, and one shortly reopened with government aid. By late month, Austrian fertilizer producer Borealis AG slashed ammonia output after the cost natgas compressed margins in an industry facing tight supplies. https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/dominos-fall-germanys-largest-ammonia-producer-slashes-output-amid-energy-crisis

World food prices rose for a second consecutive month in September to reach a 10-year peak, driven by gains for cereals and vegetable oils, the United Nations food agency said on Thursday. https://www.reuters.com/business/world-food-prices-hit-10-year-peak-fao-2021-10-07/

Global wheat prices are up 41% on last year due to “tightening export availabilities amid strong demand”. World wheat prices are up almost 4% in September compared to August. Rice prices also rose in September, while those of maize increased by a moderate 0.3% – averaging 38% higher year-on-year. https://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/global-wheat-prices-up-41-with-consumption-hitting-all-time-high/

Arabica coffee futures on ICE were higher on Thursday as the market waited to see if there would be sufficient rain in Brazil over the next few days to aid the flowering of next year's crop while cocoa and sugar prices also rose. December arabica coffee KCc1 rose 0.9% to $1.9515 per lb. December New York cocoa CCc1 rose 0.7% to $2,734 a tonne. March raw sugar SBc1 was up 1.2% at 20.00 cents per lb. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/softs-arabica-coffee-prices-rise-sugar-and-cocoa-also-up-2021-10-07

Twitch, Amazon's (AMZN) video live streaming platform, has become the latest victim of a cyberattack after an anonymous hacker claimed to have hacked the entire platform along with the source code and user payout information. ...the hacker took to 4chan (8kun) to post a torrent link of 125 GB with all the data which are now publicly available. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/twitch-cyberattack-exposes-source-codes-and-payout-information-2021-10-06

The only scenario where introducing a CBDC makes sense is in order to phase out the use of physical cash in order to be able to impose whatever negative interest rate regime the central bankers in charge judge necessary. Helicopter money, restrictions on cash holding, and negative interest rates are all part of the bundle of desirable policies that can only—or most easily—be achieved with digital currencies fully controlled by the issuing central banks. https://coinivore.com/2020/12/07/central-bank-digital-currencies-and-the-war-on-physical-cash/

At least three U.S. grain distributors’ systems have been infected with ransomware in recent weeks, raising concerns that hackers have found an easy target in a vital part of the U.S. food supply chain. All three known victims are Midwestern grain cooperatives that buy grain from farmers and then process, store and resell it for uses like livestock feed and fuel. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ransomware-hackers-find-vulnerable-target-us-grain-supply-rcna2702