05.30.20- Weekend Rant: As The World Burns
Chris Martenson

Personal safety & security are quickly becoming more important in this era of growing social rage

Decades of unfairness are now boiling over in the United States in the form of protests, riots, burning buildings and violence.

Minneapolis is on fire – literally – and the unrest has spread to numerous other major cities. Read More

05.29.20- There Will Be A Lot More Rioting, Looting And Civil Unrest As The U.S. Economy
Continues To Crumble
Michael Snyder

What we have been witnessing on the streets of Minneapolis is just the beginning.  Our nation is so deeply divided, and a large portion of the population is losing faith in the basic institutions that govern our society.  Personally, I don’t know how anyone can watch the video of what happened to George Floyd without having an emotional reaction.  Police brutality has been a massive problem in the United States for many years, and it has gotten to the point where most of the country no longer has faith in the police.  Of course the rioters are not helping their cause by burning down the communities that they are supposedly defending.  And after causing so much chaos on Wednesday night, protesters were back in the streets of Minneapolis on Thursday… Read More

05.28.20- An Economy That Cannot Allow Stocks to Decline Is Too Fragile To Survive
Charles Hugh Smith

The fragile ice shelf of speculative bets and debt clinging to the mountainside is making strange creaking sounds– will you listen or will you ignore it because ‘the Fed has our back’?

Feast your eyes on the chart below of the Nasdaq 100 stock market Index, which is dominated by the six FAAMNG stocks: Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Netflix and Google which now account for over 20% of the U.S. stock market’s capitalization. Read More

05.27.10- The “Lockdown” Has Turned America Into a Despotic, Cash-Strapped Basket-Case
Mike Whitney

“… and when we look back on this in two years time, from the ruins of our economy and the ruins of our liberty, we will want to see some kind of justice, that the people who made this decision should pay a penalty for what they’ve done.” Peter Hitchens

Economic activity across the country has collapsed, GDP is shrinking at the fastest pace on record, and the economic data is worse than anytime in history. Every sector of the economy is contracting and every economic indicator is pointing down. According to economist Nouriel Roubini, the country is headed towards a decade of “depression and debt”, and that is probably an understatement. Read More

05.26.20- America Is Dead and Buried
Doug Casey

View Video

05.25.20- Holiday Rant: The Slippery Slope to Despotism: Paved with Lockdowns, Raids and Forced Vaccinations
John W. Whitehead

You have no right not to be vaccinated, you have no right not to wear a mask, you have no right to open up your business… And if you refuse to be vaccinated, the state has the power to literally take you to a doctor’s office and plunge a needle into your arm.”- Alan Dershowitz, Harvard law professor

You have no rights.

That’s the lesson the government wants us to learn from this COVID-19 business.

Well, the government is wrong. Read More

05.22.20- CRITICAL Price Level Could Prompt A BIG MOVE In The Stock Market After Holiday
Chris Vermeulen

As technical traders and researchers, we’ve been paying very close attention to the GREEN ARC Fibonacci resistance level on the SPY as a key level for the US stock market and any hope of a continued upside price rally.  The SPY has traded near this level for the past three weeks and appears to be attempting a bit of an upside breakout right now.  Yet, we understand a long holiday weekend is upon us in the US, Memorial Day, and after a big upside GAP on Monday, the US stock market has stalled over the past few days. Read More

05.21.20- "Somebody Is Dumping Everything": Mystery Investor Pukes $333M In Real Estate ETF In Dark Pool Trade
Tyler Durden

Post-coronavirus pandemic, nobody really knows what the real estate market will look like. Will people travel less? Will we work from home more often? Will commercial and residential real estate be able to keep their respective bids once current leases run out?

We've found at least one investor who doesn't want to stick around and find out. Read More

05.20.20- Modern Monetary Theory:
The little-known consequence of the
massive coronavirus bills
Steve St Angelo

The worst part about spending $6 trillion or more on coronavirus recovery isn't what's in it. The worst part is what happens if it doesn't destroy us.

How many articles have you read lately that started off with a variation of the phrase, “These are strange times”? It’s the understatement of the millennium. Before the coronavirus crisis, if we saw someone in a grocery store wearing a face mask, we might casually wonder, “What’s wrong with him?” Today, if you walk into a grocery story without a face mask, people will indignantly wonder and sometimes ask out loud, “What the hell’s wrong with him?” Read More

05.19.20- Another week, another $3 trillion bailout
Simon Black

At precisely 9:26pm this past Friday night, May 15th, the House of Representatives in the United States passed the “Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions Act.”

For short, they call it the HEROES Act.

And yes, it’s as ridiculous as it sounds.

Bear in mind that Congress passed the first bailout bill– the “Families First Coronavirus Response Act” on March 14th. That set the taxpayers back $1.3 trillion.  Read More

05.18.20- Our Indefensible Media
Arnold Ahlert

Dispatch columnist David French has written an article defending the mainstream media, asserting that much of the criticism coming from precincts on the Right is “lazy and cheap,” “outright dishonest,” and “marked by wild and imprecise generalizations that impose collective punishment for individual failings.” He adds, “Moreover, media critics frequently ascribe evil motives to members of the press and pretend that the press has greater capabilities than it really does — thus rendering it even more culpable when it inevitably makes mistakes.”  Read More

05.16.20- Overpriced Stocks May Be Bubble
Ready to Pop
Peter Reagan

Even if local and state governments hadn’t shut down businesses in attempts to mitigate the coronavirus, the U.S. economy was still set up to take on a number of economic challenges.

But now, there’s one additional challenge being considered by billionaire David Tepper: over-inflated stock prices:

Billionaire hedge fund investor David Tepper told CNBC on Wednesday the stock market is one of the most overpriced he’s ever seen, only behind 1999. His comments sent stocks to a session low… He also said some Big Tech stocks like Amazon, Facebook and Alphabet may be “fully valued.” Read More

05.15.20- The Biggest Economic Threat Today
Brian Maher

Kind heaven, no! A fresh economic scourge is upon the land. Announces CNN:

“New Threat to the Economy: Americans Are Saving Like It’s the 1980s.”

Is a higher evil possible? Thus we are informed:

Americans are slashing their spending, hoarding cash and shrinking their credit card debt as they fear their jobs could disappear during the coronavirus pandemic… Read More

05.14.20- Total Catastrophe of
the Currency System
Egon von Greyerz

As the Nasdaq makes a new high for the year, the world outside the stock market timebomb is falling apart. For example the UN agency, The International Labour Organisation (ILO) reports that 1.6 billion jobs are at risk in the global economy. That is half of the global workforce of 3.3 billion. Particularly vulnerable are the 2 billion people in the informal economy. For most of these vulnerable people, this means no income, no food and no security reports the ILO. This is a human tragedy on a massive scale and most people in the Western world are totally unaware. Read More

05.13.20- The Worst Is Yet to Come: Contact Tracing, Immunity Cards and Mass Testing
John W. Whitehead

No one gets spared the anguish, fear and heartache of living under the shadow of an authoritarian police state.

That’s the message being broadcast 24/7 with every new piece of government propaganda, every new law that criminalizes otherwise lawful activity, every new policeman on the beat, every new surveillance camera casting a watchful eye, every sensationalist news story that titillates and distracts, every new prison or detention center built to house troublemakers and other undesirables, every new court ruling that gives government agents a green light to strip and steal and rape and ravage the citizenry, every school that opts to indoctrinate rather than educate, and every new justification for why Americans should comply with the government’s attempts to trample the Constitution underfoot. Read More

05.12.20- Five Viral Lessons
John Mauldin

We live in truly historic times. “There are decades when nothing happens, and weeks when decades happen,” says a quote usually attributed to Vladimir Lenin. It certainly fits now.

For thousands of years, people who lived through what we call “history” didn’t realize it. We are the exceptions. We’re seeing history and we know it. The Vietnam War was certainly historic, but the coronavirus killed more Americans in the last two months than died in that long conflict. The Great Depression was historic but by some indicators we are well on the way to matching it. The Manhattan Project and the Apollo missions were historic, but right now even more massive, world-changing technology and biotechnology are being hastily developed under pressure. Read More

05.11.20- The Worst Jobs Report in History
Brian Maher

The good news first:

Today’s unemployment figures were not as cataclysmic as feared. Consensus came in at 22 million.

Here is the bad news:

Today’s unemployment figures were cataclysmic nonetheless. Read More

05.09.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: No Trust: The Tree of Liberty is Parched
Ben Bartee

What did they do to the news? Walter Cronkite asks from the grave.

The nanny state, aided and abetted by a corporate news media thirsty for scared viewers confined to their homes, is about to jumpstart the nagging micro-management to level-10 warp speed – with the help of the neoliberal propaganda arms of the establishment formerly known as the free press. The rotten neoliberal 4th estate and the soulless cowards that staff them have to go. Read More

05.08.20- 52% Of Small Businesses "Expect To Be Out Of Business Within Six Months";
Shocking New Survey
Michael Snyder

Anyone that was hoping for a “quick recovery” for the U.S. economy can forget about that right now.  Yes, many states are attempting to “reopen”, but in most cases it will be a multi-stage process that takes many months to complete.  Meanwhile, fear of COVID-19 is going to keep many Americans from conducting business as usual even after all of the restrictions have been finally lifted.  Even now, many of the stores, restaurants and movie theaters that have reopened are seeing very, very few customers.  Unfortunately, millions of small businesses are not going to be able to survive in such a depressed economic environment for very long. Read More

05.07.20- Don’t Bet on America
Bill Bonner

“Never, ever bet against America,” says the Oracle of Omaha, perhaps exaggerating.

Countries, like individuals, make mistakes. And they have their seasons. It was a bad idea to bet against America throughout most of the 20th century. That, of course, is when Warren Buffett got the idea.

But this is the 21st century. America’s capital industries are losing value. Its GDP growth is slowing. Its government – technically insolvent already – prints $1 million PER SECOND to cover its deficits. Its military is engaged in pointless meddles all over the world. Its menfolks’ life expectancy is falling. Its Swamp is rising. Read More

05.06.20- This “Cure” for the Economy
Could Kill It
James Rickards

The economy remains under lockdown, although some states are beginning to relax restrictions. As with so many other aspects of American life, there’s been a red state/blue state divide.

Red states are generally more willing to reopen their economies, while harder-hit coastal blue states are generally more reluctant to open theirs. Read More

05.05.20- Stocks Bottomed and Rallied 30%
Based on a Lie
Graham Summers

If you’ll recall, on March 23rd 2020, the Federal Reserve stated that it would begin buying both U.S. Treasuries and corporate bonds with unlimited funds.

The announcement was historic in nature: never before in its 107-year history had the Fed bought corporate bonds before. IN fact, it was technically illegal for the Fed to do this as the Federal Reserve Act of 1933 expressly forbid the Fed from buying corporate bonds and other risk-assets. Read More

04.04.50- Why Assets Will Crash
Charles Hugh Smith

This is how it happens that boats that were once worth tens of thousands of dollars are set adrift by owners who can no longer afford to pay slip fees. 

The increasing concentration of the ownership of wealth/assets in the top 10% has an under-appreciated consequence: when only the top 10% can afford to buy assets, that unleashes an almost karmic payback for the narrowing of ownership, a.k.a. soaring wealth and income inequality: assets crash. Read More

05.02.20- The Market Isn’t Done Falling
Nick Giambruno

As early as January 2017, I said to expect “a stock market collapse at least as severe as 1929 or 2008.” And, “I think there’s a very high chance of a stock market crash of historic proportions before the end of Trump’s first term.”

It wasn’t a lucky wild guess, but the conclusion I came to after putting together the different pieces to see the big picture, which is what we do at Crisis Investing. Read More

05.01.20- "It's A Crock Of S**t!" - Here's Why I am so Furious This Morning
Bill Blain

I am deeply uneasy about what’s happening in financial markets

The Coronavirus has completely turned the global economy on its head. It will create the most profound changes to the way we live and our future prospects – we are all beginning to realise that. There is not going to be a V-Shaped recovery. Many lives will be shattered and ruined in its wake.

Yes, what I saw yesterday confirms two terrible truths we’ve long denied: Read More

04.30.20- No American Will Be Spared from Impending Public Pension Bailouts
Birch Gold Group

After the 2008 financial crisis, huge companies like AIG asked for billions in bailout cash, claiming they would close up shop if they didn’t get the funds.

The truth of the matter is that they had screwed up and wanted U.S. taxpayers to foot the bill. This situation left a bad taste in the mouths of most Americans. Read More

04.29.20- The Coming Greater Depression of the 2020s
Nouriel Roubini

While there is never a good time for a pandemic, the COVID-19 crisis has arrived at a particularly bad moment for the global economy. The world has long been drifting into a perfect storm of financial, political, socioeconomic, and environmental risks, all of which are now growing even more acute. Read More

04.28.20- BREAKING: White House Eyes Second Round Of Direct Payments To Americans
Matt Stoller

A White House economic adviser said Tuesday that the Trump administration is “studying very carefully” whether to provide another round of stimulus checks beyond the one-time, $1,200 direct payments, which he said could be part of a Phase 4 deal.

White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett told reporters on the White House driveway that those who qualify could receive another check. Read More

04.27.20- How the Unicorn Blowup & Oil Bust Bleed into Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities
Wolf Richter

CMBS get to eat it all: Amid overvalued vacant collateral, there is a new thingy: Tenants delaying rent payments and landlords asking for forbearance.

The office segment of the commercial real estate market – and the debt and the commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) that are backed by it – are going through serious gyrations on a combination of factors. Companies have figured out how to make work-from-home manageable. Other companies are moving out, leaving buildings vacant, or are deferring rent payments. Read More

04.25.20- Weekend Rant:
A Conservative Resurrection?
Paul Craig Roberts

Conservative magazines have pretty much disappeared along with conservatives in education, popular culture, politics, publishing, media, and Hollywood.  Magazines that helped to sustain stable families, good manners, the value of integrity, moral behavior, tending to one’s own garden, and Christian virtues such as compassion have been replaced by neoconservatives advocating war for American hegemony.  

One magazine that lingered, Chronicles, was a mild and not very exciting voice, but recent issues under the new editorship of Paul Gottfried have resurrected trenchant writing and analysis of America’s perilous degeneration into a Tower of Babel. Read More

04.24.20- Business Owners Understand Why the Economy Can't Just Be "Reopened"
Christopher E. Baecker

My oldest turned seventeen last month. To commemorate the occasion, she and I watched Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. I’d taken her to her first (allegedly) rated-R movie a couple years ago to see the quite good Baby Driver, but this was Tarantino.

Brad Pitt won an Oscar for portraying Cliff Booth, the personal stuntman for Leonardo DiCaprio’s struggling actor Rick Dalton. Early on, Cliff consoles Rick after Rick interprets a dinner meeting as a signal that he is officially a “has-been.” The next morning, as he’s dropping Rick off on set, Cliff reassures him that “you’re Rick [expletive] Dalton. Don’t you forget it.” Read More

04.23.20- Trump Says "No" To World Money
James Rickards

Over the course of 13 years as a media commentator and nine years as a bestselling author, I’ve had frequent occasion to state the following:

“In 1998, Wall Street came together to bail out a hedge fund. In 2008, the Federal Reserve stepped forward to bail out Wall Street. Each crisis was worse than the one before. In the next crisis, who will bail out the Fed?”

This was more than just rhetoric. It was a clinical description of a pattern of worsening crises on an approximately 10-year tempo, along with escalating bailouts. Read More

04.22.20- "Negative" Oil?
Bill Holter

Please note, this article was posted for subscribers Monday morning after suggesting “negative oil” on Saturday’s weekly call.

I made the comment on Saturday’s call, “we had negative interest rates, now we wait for negative oil prices”. I received a few questions because the negative price of anything makes no sense right? Well actually it does. Because demand has dropped so precipitously and production has continued unabated, supply is piling up. In the real world this is a huge problem because the oversupply must be stored somewhere. Oil is now being stored on previously empty tankers because land based storage facilities are overflowing. Read More

04.21.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: What if the Lockdown Was All
a Big Mistake?
Dr. Ron Paul

From California to New Jersey, Americans are protesting in the streets. They are demanding an end to house arrest orders given by government officials over a virus outbreak that even according to the latest US government numbers will claim fewer lives than the seasonal flu outbreak of 2017-2018.

Across the US, millions of businesses have been shut down by “executive order” and the unemployment rate has skyrocketed to levels not seen since the Great Depression. Americans, who have seen their real wages decline thanks to Federal Reserve monetary malpractice, are finding themselves thrust into poverty and standing in breadlines. It is like a horror movie, but it’s real. Read More

04.20.20- Is Private Equity Having Its Minsky Moment?
Matt Stoller

Welcome to BIG, a newsletter about the politics of monopoly. If you’d like to sign up, you can do so here. Or just read on…

Today I’m going to write about how private equity is reacting to the pandemic and the bailouts. PE is heavily indebted, and therefore is at high risk in a shock. I’m going to explore PE’s vulnerability, and how the industry is engaged in a political strategy to repurpose the Federal Reserve to its ends. I’ll also explore whether their strategy can work. Read More

04.18.20- Coronavirus in the U.S.:
Fauci Versus Trump
Bill Bonner

SAN MARTIN, ARGENTINA – The liberal establishment press – The New York Times, The Washington Post – maintains that Dr. Fauci is the voice of reason and science. Donald Trump they regard as a paragon of prejudice and ignorance.

Fox News and the right-wing media trust Trump’s instincts. They believe the medical bureaucrats are trying to bring him down. But we are in a credulous age. People are ready to believe anything. Read More

04.17.20- The looming derivative crisis
Alasdair Macleod

The powerful forces of bank credit contraction are at the heart of a rapidly evolving financial crisis in global derivatives, whose gross value is over $600 trillion; an unimaginable sum. Central banks are on course to destroy their currencies through unlimited monetary expansion, lethal for bullion banks with fractionally reserved unallocated gold accounts, while being dramatically short of Comex futures. Read More

04.16.20- Will it be an Inflationary or Deflationary Depression?
Doug Casey

At some point, the economy is no longer controlled by individual citizens in the marketplace but by government “planners,” who find they have only one of two alternatives: stop “stimulating” and permit a full-scale credit collapse, or continue stimulating until the dollar loses all value and society breaks down.

Depending on which they choose, we will have a depression characterized by deflation or by hyperinflation. Read More

04.15.20- Coronavirus And The Coming Financial Revolution
Michael Kern

The coronavirus pandemic is one of the biggest and unprecedented seismic shifts in the global economy that we’ve ever seen in modern history, and it’s just getting started.               

Already, economies around the world are shutting down. The federal reserve has pumped trillions into the United States economy in just a matter of days. Global supply chains have collapsed as entire Chinese industries went dark. And this is just the first stage. We’re heading into a year’s long recession that will have far-reaching consequences, some of which we can predict with near certainty, and some of which will be entirely unpredictable. Read More

04.14.20- Total system failure will give rise
to new economy
Pepe Escobar

Covid-19 driven collapse of global supply chains, demand and mobility will painfully spawn next great tech-led economic models

Is the world on a collision course with the financial and economic equivalent of a meteor impact with shock wave? Fractal illustration: AFP

Nobody, anywhere, could have predicted what we are now witnessing: in a matter of only a few weeks the accumulated collapse of global supply chains, aggregate demand, consumption, investment, exports, mobility. Read More

04.13.20- Buy The Tumor, Sell the News
Charles Hugh Smith

The fictitious valuation of the stock market will eventually re-connect with reality in a violent decline.

No, buy the tumor, sell the news ™ is not a typo: the stock market is a lethal tumor in our economy and society. Buy the rumor, sell the news encapsulates the old traders’ wisdom that markets rise on the sizzle of hope, promises, projections, Federal Reserve pimping (see below), tax cuts, etc. etc. etc., not on the actual steak of sales and profits. Read More

04.11.20- Markets and Black Swans
Jim Rickards

I began studying complexity theory as a consequence of my involvement with Long-Term Capital Management, LTCM, the hedge fund that collapsed in 1998 after derivatives trading strategies went catastrophically wrong.

After the collapse and subsequent rescue, I chatted with one of the LTCM partners who ran the firm about what went wrong. I was familiar with markets and trading strategies, but I was not expert in the highly technical applied mathematics that the management committee used to devise its strategies. Read More

04.10.20- The Greatest Financial Crisis & Global Hyperinflation That Will Spread Like Coronavirus
Egon von Greyerz

A Hyperinflationary Depression has always been the inevitable end to the biggest financial bubble in history…

A Hyperinflationary Depression has always been the inevitable end to the biggest financial bubble in history. And this time it will be global. Hyperinflation will spread from country to country like Coronavirus. It could start anywhere but the most likely first countries are the US and the EU or ED (European Disunion). They will quickly be followed by many more like Japan and most developing countries. Like CV it will quickly jump from country to country with very few being spared. Read More

04.09.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Michael J. Burry (The Weird Genius in the Movie “The Big Short”): “End the Lockdown”
Vigtlant Citizen

Michael J. Burry is mostly known for predicting the 2007 mortgage crisis months in advance and for inspiring the movie “The Big Short”. In the midst of COVID-19 panic, this financial genius (who usually values his privacy) created a Twitter account to communicate one single message: End the lockdown

The movie The Big Short was inspired by the true story of Michael J. Burry, the weird and slightly autistic hedge fund manager who shorted the mortgage bond market in 2007 (his role was played by Christian Bale). Read More

04.08.20- The Greatest Idiot...
Bill Blain

“The greatest idiot is a man who thinks strong stock markets are an indication of economic health.“

Yesterday was a curious day in markets... The good news ran out of steam and the rally faded... Reality rears its head again? Was it just a bull phase in a bear market, or something more significant? Does the market realise just how deep the crisis has bit into the real economy? Read More

04.07.20- The global food supply chain wasn’t designed for this
Simon Black

In the early 1980s, doctors and medical researchers around the world were confounded by the growing number of young, otherwise healthy patients who were dying of rare infections that typically only occurred in people with very weak immune systems.

The situation was so alarming that the CDC in the United States set up a special task force in 1982 to study the condition.  Read More

04.06.20- The JackPot Chronicles Scenario 1: Force Majeure
Mark E. Jeftovic

Force Majeure means:

a chance occurrence or superior force that renders a contract unenforceable and frees all parties from their obligations under it.

We are frequently told that there exists some manner of “Social Contract” to which we are implicitly bound by virtue of being alive. This implied Social Contract confers legitimacy upon the institutions that order our world, the national governments, the central banks, the miltary and police. And by extension certain communication outlets and media are endowed with a status of official curators over the narratives around institutional power. Read More

04.04.20- Government and Economics
Made Dead Simple
James D. Best

There are only two types of governments.  Two.  That's it.  There are those where the people control the government and those where the government controls the people.  Likewise, there are only two types of economic systems: economies where free markets control commerce and economies where bureaucrats control commerce.

It's that simple.  Really. Read More

04.03.20- What Is America Going To Look Like With Tens Of Millions Of Unemployed Workers?
Michael Snyder

In all of U.S. history, we have never seen a spike in unemployment like we are witnessing right now.  Last Thursday it was announced that more than 3.2 million Americans had filed new claims for unemployment benefits during the previous week, and many believe that the number that will be announced this Thursday will be even larger.  By the way, the previous all-time record for a single week was just 695,000.  So what is happening right now is absolutely nuts.  49 percent of U.S. companies anticipate conducting layoffs within the next 3 months, and the St. Louis Fed is projecting that the unemployment rate in this country will soon rise to 32 percent.  Before the coronavirus pandemic started shutting virtually everything down, approximately 158 million Americans were employed, and so we could soon have tens of millions of unemployed workers on our hands if the St. Louis Fed’s projection is accurate. Read More

04.02.20- Italy's Communist Recipe for Disaster
Giacomino Nicolazzo

Montecalvo, Lombardy, Italy . “As I sit here in my involuntary isolation, it was just reported that overnight 743 more people died and 5.249 new cases have been reported. This brings the total cases of infection to 69,176 and the body count to 6,820. We take relief in knowing that 8,326 people have recovered so far. (Numbers as of 3/24, 8:30pm in Italy)

Most towns here in Italy, from the upper reaches of the Alps to the ancient shores of Sicilia and Sardenia, while not deserted, are closer to being ghost towns than the bustling centers of tourism, business and daily life they were just a few weeks ago. Read More

04.01.20- Is the U.S. Able to Handle COVID-19? – Global Prospects Hang on This Question
Alastair Crooke

Eventually, the coronavirus will subside; but what will America look like when it does?

As the lockdowns across Europe began to bite, the U.S. Establishment began its ‘wobble’. The more elegant amongst élite circles pointed to a dangerous mis-match in timelines: The medical advice has been: ‘lockdown until the virus begins to subside’, but that advice encompassed too, the possibility of Covid-19 returning later in the year in a Phase Two, thus requiring further personal distancing. Hands shot high in absolute horror amongst some business and Wall Street leaders: Could the U.S. economy sustain such a prospect? Might not a long shutdown inflict permanent damage? Would there even be an economy left – to resurrect – in the wake of ‘peak Coronavirus’? Read More

03.31.20- The Economic Depression Of 2020: Many Of The Restaurants, Bars And Retailers That Have Closed Will Never Open Again
Michael Snyder

It appears that we are heading into the worst economic downturn of the post-World War II era, and that is going to be true no matter how this coronavirus pandemic ultimately plays out.  There are some that believe that this virus will only kill thousands, and there are others that are warning that it could kill millions, but everyone can agree that this outbreak is causing an unprecedented amount of fear.  And even once this pandemic starts to fade, a certain percentage of the population will continue to be afraid to go to restaurants, bars and other small businesses that are open to the public. Read More

03.30.20- Forced Liquidation
James Howard Kunstler

Historians of the future, pan-roasting fresh-caught June bugs over their campfires, may wonder when, exactly, was the moment when the financial world broke with reality. Was it when Nixon slammed the “gold window” shut? When “maestro” Alan Greenspan first bamboozled a Senate finance committee? When Pets.com face-planted 268 days after its IPO? When Ben Bernanke declared the housing bubble “contained?”Read More

03.28.20- No, You Do Not Hear the Fat Lady Warming Up
Bob Moriarty

Those who never predicted a financial collapse in the first place are now edging closer to the swamp to dip their toes into the water. Now they are suggesting, perhaps we could have a recession."

Forget that. You cannot have every supply chain in the world chopped in two and have a recession. A depression was baked into the cake before the Corona popped out of the six-pack. The US government dumping a $6 trillion dollar bailout for their buddies that has more pork in it than the butt of a two-ton pig is the proverbial pissing up a rope. We are in a depression. The entire financial system, education system, medical system, political system, hell, the entire artifice needs a total reset. Read More

03.27.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Can This Pandemic Usher in
a New Era?
Patrick J. Buchanan

To fight the coronavirus at home, France is removing all military forces from Iraq.

When NATO scaled back its war games in Europe because of the pandemic, Russia reciprocated. Moscow announced it would cancel its war games along NATO’s border.

Nations seem to be recognizing and responding to the grim new geostrategic reality of March 2020: The pandemic is the real enemy of us all, and while we fight it, each in his own national corner, we are in this together. Read More

03.26.20- Professor Malinen: The Euro Won’t Survive This Crisis
Jan Nieuwenhuijs

To better understand the economic consequences of the Corona pandemic, I wanted to interview an expert on economic crises. Namely, Tuomas Malinen.Malinen is the CEO and Chief Economist of GnS Economics, a macroeconomic consultancy. He’s also an Adjunct Professor of Economics at the University of Helsinki. He has studied economics at the University of Helsinki and New York University. His focus is on economic growth, economic crises, central banks, and the business cycle. Read More

COVID-19: Market panic and how to navigate through it
Jonathan M Mergott

I haven't written any market updates in some time, and was quite surprised to be receiving requests for one.  I am going to attempt to go over as much as possible without devolving into a rant.  There is so much happening to analyze and consider, everything from the markets, to politics and of course the corona virus pandemic, and every bit of it is interconnected and affecting the outcomes of everything else.  I am going to break this into individual sections analyzing the important issues, markets, and ending with a feasible investment and savings plan for people to follow as we navigate through some of the most volatile markets in this country's (and the world's) history. Read More

03.24.20- COVID-19 Data Study: Ammunition Sales Continue to Soar in Response to
Coronavirus Panic
Molly Carter

Updated March 22, 2020: As the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has spread across the United States, its impact can be seen in every community. Businesses and schools are closed, the stock market is exceptionally volatile, and store shelves are empty as the American public has scrambled to prepare for the worldwide pandemic and social distancing prescribed by the WHO and CDC. Read More

03.23.20- This Is Not a Recession
Hunter Hastings

Economists and Wall Street analysts are using the word recession to describe the looming plunge in output in the US economy. We’ll just make the point early that economists, exhibiting the typical emptiness of their failed science, can’t even agree on the definition of recession.

Undeterred by lacking a definition, the geniuses at Goldman Sachs and elsewhere on Wall Street are unrestrained in predicting the imminent arrival of the condition they can’t describe. Read More

03.21.20- The Crash of the “Everything Bubble” Is Here – And It’s Not Going Away Anytime Soon
Brandon Smith

Last November, in an article titled ‘The Economic Crash So Far: A Look At The Real Numbers’, I outlined the reality of statistical fraud by governments and central banks to hide the ongoing economic downturn. The Everything Bubble, perhaps the biggest debt fueled bubble in history, has been propping up the global economy for several years, but began to waver dramatically at the end of 2018, as the Federal Reserve tightened liquidity conditions into economic weakness (just as they did in 1929 and in the early 1930’s as the Great Depression took hold).

In that article, I warned: Read More

03.20.20- Banks are going to drown in an ocean of defaults
Simon Black

On November 6, 2000, then US presidential candidate George W. Bush told a crowd of cheering supporters, “they misunderestimated me.”

Now, if English is not your native language, allow me to clear the air: ‘misunderestimate’ is not a word. But then again, George W. Bush was legendary for hilarious slip-ups like this.

There are entire books dedicated to his ‘Bushisms,’ the ridiculous made-up words and incomprehensible sayings that became routine for the 43rd US President. Read More

03.19.20- Quantum Computing. Honeywell
and JP Morgan Chase
Joseph P. Farrell

This is a really important story that was shared by K.J. (to whom a big thank you!). Honeywell, it seems, has created the world’s most powerful quantum computer, replacing Google’s claim. Or at least, that’s the story. And we’ve all been seeing these stories for some time now, about how quantum computers are the next leap forward, able to handle orders of magnitude more calculations than ordinary Tray super-computers, and do so much faster.

So what’s the big deal here? Why another story about quantum computing and “the latest breakthrough”? Read More

03.18.20- S&P 500 Plunged Most Since 1987, Gave Up in 18 Days the 42% Gains of Past 3 Years. Boeing Shares Collapsed
Wolf Richter

It started out ugly Sunday night and ended uglier today. Sunday evening, stock futures plunged 5%, hit limit down, and trading was halted. Futures remained pinned at limit down without further trading. When stocks started trading in the morning during regular hours, the S&P 500 Index opened at 2,490, down -8.1%. This was below the limit down rule during regular hours where trading should stop for 15 minutes if the index drops 7%. But it had blown through this limit-down from the first moment. Read More

03.17.20- "What The F**k Are These Guys Smoking...?"
Bill Blain

“Well, it has to happen. Because if it doesn’t happen, we hit the wall next week. We’re already in breach.”

Happy St Patricks day.

Meanwhile… back in Today

Yesterday was another nasty day – uncertainty, panic and fear fuelling the worst fears for the market. The scale of capitulation was massive – Treasuries heading for zero percent, stocks biggest down day for 33 years, and gold sliding because investors literally have nothing else to sell to meet margin calls. If you aren’t out yet, you are stuck. Forget liquidity – it’s impossible to exit even liquid index ETFs. Read More

03.16.20- When the Coronavirus Scare Is Over, Economic Armageddon Will Remain!
Gary D. Barnett

“Only a psychopath would ever think of doing these things, only a psychopath would dream of abusing other people in such a way, only a psychopath would treat people as less than human just for money. The shocking truth is, even though they now have most if not all of the money, they want still more, they want all of the money that you have left in your pockets, they want it all because they have no empathy with other people, with other creatures, they have no feeling for the world which they exploit, they have no love or sense of being or belonging for their souls are dead, dead to all things but greed and a desire to rule over others.” ~ Arun D. Ellis, Corpalism Read More

03.14.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: WOW! Watch Term Limits Advocate SHRED Congress!
Nick Tomboulides

View Video

03.13.20- Predictions are hard. But here goes…
Simon Black

We certainly live in extraordinary times.

Even people who have been irrationally dismissive of the Corona pandemic up until this point finally had to wake up and smell reality yesterday. The NBA. Tom Hanks. European travel ban.

Our human brains, while magnificent and inspiring, are also wired in bizarre ways. We’re filled with countless ‘cognitive biases’ which affect our judgment, usually for the worse. Read More

03.12.20- The Butterfly Effect
Scott Minerd

The market is waking up to not just the viral contagion of coronavirus, but also to financial, economic, and geopolitical contagion.

If I had written a commentary on how 4,000 people dying from the flu would topple global financial markets, I think I would have been deemed insane. Yet today that is exactly the story. Read More

03.11.20- “The Most Critical Time Since the Financial Crisis”
Brian Maher

“We’re faced with the most critical time since the financial crisis.”

This we have on the grim authority of money man Sven Henrich.

Last evening prepared us for this morning’s hells…Read More

03.10.20- Why the Fed Won’t Save the Market
Michael Snyder

We haven’t seen anything like this since the last financial crisis erupted in 2008.  Wall Street has been gripped by a tremendous amount of fear, and the volatility that we are witnessing would have been unimaginable just a couple of months ago.  On Monday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 2,013 points.  To put that in perspective, the largest single day decline that we witnessed in 2008 was just 777 points.  A disagreement between Saudi Arabia and Russia about oil prices coupled with increasing concern about the coronavirus pushed many traders into panic mode, and the result was absolutely stunning.  Hopefully stock prices will bounce back throughout the rest of this week, but many experts are warning that this is just the beginning of the carnage.  The stock market crash of 2020 is here, and the losses are already staggering.  Just consider these facts… Read More

03.09.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: The Virus is a Time Machine
Raúl Ilargi Meijer

Around mid-January I started including coronavirus news in the daily Automatic Earth “Debt Rattle” news aggregators, and wrote the first essay on the topic on January 29. Tons of people since have asked why, but I thought the virus had “potential”. Though not everybody would agree, I still think that. So the Debt Rattles are full of coronavirus these days.

For a proper understanding, we must remember that China was 4-5 weeks too late in reporting the disease, and after that the west was 4-5 weeks late in acting on the news. This happens simply because a politician who cries wolf will have a short career, and reporters, certainly today, follow that same model. Read More

03.07.20- What Your Financial Advisor Isn’t Telling You About Bitcoin
Teeka Tiwari

If you have a financial advisor, you’ll probably want to fire them after you read this.

You see, many Wall Street firms won’t tell you the truth about bitcoin – at least, not yet.

Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan ban their financial advisors from talking about bitcoin. Wells Fargo advisors can only hand out research “primers” on bitcoin – if their clients ask about it. Read More

03.06.20- Will This Coronavirus Outbreak Cause A New Financial Crisis And
A Horrifying Economic Collapse?
Michael Snyder

The term “black swan event” is increasingly being used to describe this coronavirus outbreak, and many are concerned that what we are headed for will be much worse than what we experienced in 2008 and 2009.  Already, we have witnessed a staggering drop in global demand, Wall Street has had to deal with the wildest week in eight years, and people all over the globe are hoarding toilet paper, face masks and hand sanitizer.  That may sound like a plot from one of my books, but it is not.  This is actually happening, and it appears that we are still only in the very early chapters of this crisis. Read More

03.05.20- Stock Market Overmedicated on FedMed, Patient Goes into Cardiac Arrest
David Haggith

The Federal Reserve on Tuesday gave the market a double-dose of exactly what it thought the market needed, and the market just about died! On the theory that, if a little is good, more is better, the Fed gave a double cut of interest. It did not go as planned.

At first, the medicine hit like nitroglycerin tablets, and the patient’s heart leaped. You can see how instantly the patient bolted up on the operating table in the graph, but the double dose the Fed administered was too much, and by the end of the day the patient’s vital signs were down 785 points. Read More

03.04.20- Peniaphobia Prevails
Michael Ballanger

Sector expert Michael Ballanger charts tumbling markets amid the scare of a coronavirus pandemic.

(Peniaphobia: fear of poverty)

This weekend, newsletter writers the world over are scrambling to explain to their paid subscribers why they are now showing losses in portfolios that were supposed to be showing gains, and especially because it was only two weeks ago that the S&P 500 hit all-time highs at 3,393.52. Without going into a long diatribe over the multiple warnings I issued in January, Mother Nature (or a bioweapons lab) has provided the pinprick that has now popped the global equities bubble, triggering a gargantuan rush to the exits and liquidity. Read More

03.03.20- Why The Coming Economic Collapse Will Not Be Caused By Covid-19
Matthew Ehret

With last week's collapse in the stock market, the internet has been set ablaze with discussion of a new crash looming on the horizon (even with today's record-breaking point-gain in the Dow). The fact that such a chain reaction collapse was only kept at bay due to massive liquidity injections by the Federal Reserve’s overnight repo loans should not be ignored. Read More

03.02.20- Globalization and Our Precarious Medical Supply Chains
F. William Engdahl

The grave risks and dangers in the process of worldwide out-sourcing and so-called globalization of the past 30 years or so are becoming starkly clear as the ongoing health emergency across China threatens vital world supply chains from China to the rest of the world. While much attention is focused on the risks to smartphone components or auto manufacture via supplies of key parts from China or to the breakdown of oil deliveries in the last weeks, there is a danger that will soon become alarmingly clear in terms of global health care system. Read More

02.29.20- Market Meltdown Update
Adam Taggart

Sentiment has snapped. Did the 10-year bull market just end?

We’ve been covering the spread of the coronavirus so intently over the past 30 days that we’d understand if you might have forgotten that, actually, we usually focus on many other topics on this website than global pandemics. Read More

02.28.20- The Great Melt-up Melt Down
David Haggith

That didn’t take long. Just a month ago, I wrote, “Stock Market More Overpriced and Perilous Than Anytime in History,” stating that the market was poised for a big fall because “some of the market’s most fundamental valuation metrics are now printing at levels never seen before…. This market is tripping on some pricy hallucinogens.”

And here we are! A single black swan has knocked the legs out from under the bull. It’s not a full-blown correction yet (requiring indices fall by, at least, 10%) or a crash (20% or more), though it looks like it could hit that mark by the end of today. That would be a full correction in just four days. Read More

02.27.20- The Greatest Depression Just Began. This is no Drill
Bob Moriarty

Exactly a month ago I warned that the Corona Virus outbreak was going to pop the “Everything Bubble.” I did something fairly subtle. I buried my main message under a whole heap of cow manure. It doesn’t make a rat’s ass if I was right or wrong about calling for a market crash in October or the Fed dumping piles of new crisp $100 bills onto a bonfire in September. Read More

02.26.20- “1984” Has Come to China
James Rickards

You’re probably familiar with George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four; (it’s often published as 1984). It was written in 1948; the title comes from reversing the last two digits in 1948.

The novel describes a world of three global empires, Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia, in a constant state of war.

Orwell created an original vocabulary for his book, much of which is in common, if sardonic, usage today. Terms such as Thought Police, Big Brother, doublethink, Newspeak and memory hole all come from Nineteen Eight-Four. Read More

02.25.20- When the world became unrecognizable in less than a decade
Simon Black

In the year 1520, exactly 500 years ago, a German scholar named Johan Schoner completed a map of the world that was widely considered to be humanity’s most advanced understanding of geography at that time.

To us, Schoner’s map is pretty amusing.

There’s scarcely any American continent. Instead he drew some amorphous blobs to mark Brazil and the ‘West Indies’. And there’s a very narrow body of water where the Pacific Ocean is supposed to be, separating Brazil and India.  Read More

02.24.20- Coronavirus Slams Chinese Economy
Jim Rickards

How bad is the coronavirus pandemic in China? It’s worse than the Chinese government knows and worse than the world believes.

Here are the official statistics on the coronavirus (technically COVID-19) as of today: There are 75,685 confirmed infections worldwide, with 98% of that total in China alone. Of those cases, 82.5% are in the single province of Hubei, mostly centered in the city of Wuhan, with 11 million residents.

Of the over 75,000 worldwide cases, there have been 2,236 deaths; that’s a mortality rate of roughly 2.5%. If a 2.5% mortality rate sounds low, it’s not. That’s roughly comparable to the Spanish flu pandemic of 1919–20 that killed 50 million people by some estimates. Read More

02.22.20- The American dream of retirement isn’t going to be fulfilled, says Raoul Pal
Alessandra Malito

Are baby boomers investing too much in risk? This former hedge fund manager says so

Older Americans looking to retire may want to reassess their investment portfolio before the next market downturn. 

There are many strategies to invest for retirement, but if they include loading up on stocks in your old age, they’re dangerous, says Raoul Pal, former hedge fund manager and chief executive officer and co-founder of financial media company Real Vision. Read More

02.21.20- It’s Too Late to Make America Great Again
Bill Bonner

RANCHO SANTANA, NICARAGUA – Children shouldn’t have to learn that Santa Claus doesn’t exist. And some facts are too brutal even for adults.

That things go down as well as up… and get worse as well as better… is blindingly obvious to everyone over 55. But it will come as a rude shock to today’s investors.

So will today’s insight: that there are hard seasons in human life as well as soft ones. Read More

02.20.20- We’re in an Age of
Technological Stupidity
Bill Bonner

RANCHO SANTANA, NICARAGUA – We’re down here on the Pacific coast. Lovers in one another’s arms. Birds in the trees. And even the old men like it.

Here’s our little cottage:>>>

But even down here in the tropics, our Dear Readers’ comments reach us. Here’s one:

“Our economy is the best it has been maybe ever. Read More

02.19.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Why the Tax Man Won’t Let
Cannabis Go Legit
Jim Hoffer

With the Democratic primaries underway, the candidates’ rhetoric has started to feel like a posturing contest. They all seem to think that voters want to back the candidate who’s most interested in raising taxes, so they try to outdo each other with talk about fantastical “wealth tax” constructs that will wipe out everyone’s debt.

As impressive as this showmanship is, a thriving economy and a balanced budget are already within our reach – no redistribution of wealth required. We just need to stop leaving money on the table. The legal and fiscal mess that currently surrounds legal marijuana proves this point. Read More

02.18.20- Q4 Earnings Shocker: Excluding The FAAMGs, Net Income Is Down 7.5%
Tyler Durden

Yesterday we showed readers a remarkable statistic from the latest Weekly Kickstart report by Goldman's David Kostin: according to the chief Goldman US equity strategist, whereas modest S&P500 earnings growth in Q4 was set to finally end a 4 quarters-streak of negative EPS growth, with S&P earnings per share set to rise by a modest 2% Y/Y, virtually all of the earnings upside came from just the top 5 biggest companies: Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and Google (aka FAAMG), which collectively saw their EPS rise by a whopping 16% (mostly on the back of record stock buybacks which reduced the number of shares outstanding thus lowering the denominator in the EPS calculation). Read More

02.17.20- Coronavirus and credit – a perfect storm
Alasdair Macleod

This article posits that the spread of the coronavirus coincides with the downturn in the global credit cycle, with potentially catastrophic results. At the time of writing, analysts are still trying to get to grips with the virus’s economic impact and they commonly express the hope that after a month or two everything will return to normal. This seems too optimistic.

The credit crisis was already likely to be severe, given the combination of the end of a prolonged expansionary phase of the credit cycle and trade protectionism. These were the conditions that led to the Wall Street crash of 1929-32. Given similar credit cycle and trade dynamics today, the question to be resolved is how an overvaluation of bonds and equities coupled with escalating monetary inflation will play out. Read More

02.15.20- Minerd: There Is a "Stunning Cognitive Dissonance" Just Like Before
the Start of World War II
Tyler Durden

Guggenheim Partners' Scott Minerd warned in a new market outlook titled "Peace for Our Time: The coronavirus is a looming economic problem" that the Covid-19 outbreak in China is the latest red flag for investors could prick the corporate debt bubble. 

Minerd says, "cognitive dissonance in the credit market is stunning." He compares today's uncomfortable and eerie stillness in the corporate bond market to the late 1930s, right before the Nazis started bombing Britain. Read More

02.14.20- The Coming Decade Will Be Bad For Just About Everyone, Except Goldbugs
John Rubino

The coming decade will be especially grim for the super-rich, whose wealth creation will implode. Here’s why…

Poetic Justice Coming For The 1%

To understand just how grim the coming decade is likely to be for the world’s super-rich, let’s start with three premises: Read More

02.13.20- Our "Come to Mao" Reckoning and the Next Cultural Revolution
Charles Hugh Smith

Only fools are blind to the potential for this uprising to extend to Apple and the rest of Corporate America's greedy exploiters who've been delighted to profit from the protection of the CCP.

Let's start our "Come to Mao" reckoning with the obvious:

To the U.S. stock market:
The coronavirus ravaging China doesn't matter.
China doesn't matter.
1,500 deaths don't matter, 5,000 deaths don't matter, 50,000 deaths don't matter, 500,000 deaths don't matter.
10,000 coronavirus cases don't matter, 100,000 cases don't matter,
1,000,000 cases don't matter. Read More

02.12.20- The Forces That Degenerate an Empire
Bill Bonner

We’re doing a lot of things that are very good, including waste and fraud – tremendous waste and tremendous fraud. – Donald J. Trump

BALTIMORE, MARYLAND – Day by day, the empire ages… drooping unto death.

Yesterday came news that Bernie Sanders narrowly won the New Hampshire primary. Read More

02.11.20- Just 4 Companies Account For 67% Of The S&P 500’s YTD Returns
Nick Colas

In mid-December 2019 we published a list of the 11 worst performing names in the S&P 500. The purpose of that exercise was twofold. First, buying the laggards at the end of a calendar year into tax loss selling anticipating a bounce in the New Year is a common hedge fund strategy – a turbo-charged play on the January Effect. Second, any big loser that does not rally once that selling stops is in real trouble. Read More

02.10.20- The end of the global economy
Richard (Rick) Mills

The Trump administration has just granted its Commerce Department sweeping powers to slap tariffs on countries it decides are manipulating their currencies to the detriment of the United States and its exporting companies.  

For some this will come as news; at AOTH, it is confirmation that our earlier warning, reported here, has come true. Read More

02.08.20- Tesla Stock Price Volatility a Sign of 'Frothy' Market
Peter Reagan

Near the end of a bull run, it's fairly common for "frothy" conditions to develop in the financial markets. This often occurs shortly before bubbles pop.

According to Investopedia, "Froth refers to market conditions preceding an actual market bubble, where asset prices become detached from their underlying intrinsic values as demand for those assets drives their prices to unsustainable levels." Read More

02.07.20- When Trust Evaporates
Chris MacIntosh

I thought I’d compare the current Wuhan zombie apocalypse bat virus to that of SARS and see what is similar this time around…and what is not.

Now, I’m not going to get into which virus wins the “I killed more faster”, (thus far, it was SARS with a fatality rate of 9.6% vs 2.8%). Or which is more infectious (SARS again, though Coronavirus can spread while still incubating). Or join the silly debate of whether we should eat bats (they carry the disease, so ummm…NO). Rather, I’m going to focus on what’s been different in terms of the reaction globally…and why this is important. Because let’s face it, statistically, you’re still far more likely to be killed by some dolt crossing the centerline while watching his Insta feed…and nobody is running around like chickens screaming…don’t drive, don’t drive. Read More

02.06.20- How are Stocks Going Up While Earnings Go Down?
Tom McClellan

The primary driver of stock prices is supposedly earnings, right? So how is it that earnings as a percentage of GDP have been falling since a peak in late 2014, and yet the major averages like the DJIA and SP500 are up 60% since then?

This week’s chart looks at some data which is buried deep within the Bureau of Economic Analysis’ report on National Income and Product Accounts. You can find it  here, then go to table 1.10, line 15. Like I said, it is deep. Read More

02.05.20- When Pelosi Ripped Trump’s Speech In Half, Was It A Harbinger Of What Is About To Happen To America During This Election?
Michael Snyder

It is a rare thing to witness a truly iconic moment happen on live television, but that is precisely what tens of millions of Americans had the opportunity to do on Tuesday night.  At the conclusion of President Trump’s State of the Union address, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ripped her copy of Trump’s speech in half in front of a nationwide audience.  We have never seen anything like that before in the entire history of this country, but of course so many unprecedented things have taken place during Trump’s presidency.  Pelosi is claiming that she did not plan in advance to rip the speech in half, and at that moment she probably wasn’t doing much thinking at all, but it is a moment that will live in all of our memories for the rest of our lives. Read More

02.04.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Deplatformed... How Big Tech Companies & Corporate America Subvert the Second Amendment
 Sam Jacobs

Twitter permanently banned the libertarian financial website Zero Hedge from the platform on Friday—January 31st after it published an article questioning the involvement of a Chinese scientist in the outbreak of the deadly Coronavirus.

Anyone familiar with the Bible is familiar with the Mark of the Beast: Without this mark, no man may buy or sell. Read More

02.03.20- Coronavirus Creating Worries of an Economic “Black Swan”
Birch Gold Group

The quickly-spreading coronavirus is understandably causing worry in the markets.

Originating in Wuhan, China, the virus moved from animals to humans at a local food market. Since then, it has since spread to other parts of China and beyond.

Jim Rickards compares this virus with a potential economic “contagion” that can result as the concern over the virus turns into panic and causes distress. Read More

02.01.20- Will The Coronavirus Outbreak Cause A Massive Stock Market Crash?
Michael Snyder

Could it be possible that this coronavirus outbreak will be the trigger that finally bursts the biggest stock market bubble in U.S. history?  As I have discussed previously, stock prices in the United States were the most overvalued that they have ever been during the month of January, and our stock market has never been more perfectly primed for a huge meltdown.  But stock prices are all about what investors believe will happen in the future, and if they remain convinced that the future is bright then perhaps this stock market bubble could persist for a while longer.  Unfortunately for Wall Street, this coronavirus outbreak is starting to create a wave of fear in the financial community.  In fact, concern about the coronavirus pushed the Dow Jones Industrial Average down more than 600 points on Friday, which represented the worst day for the Dow since last August... Read More

01.31.20- Estimating the shape
of the coming crisis
Alasdair Macleod

We don’t know what will trigger the crisis, but a likely candidate is foreign selling of US dollars combining with a collapse in the US government’s finances. Perhaps the coronavirus will turn out to be a black swan event, but the underlying conditions for an economic and monetary crisis already exist.

This article looks at alternative outcomes. It concludes that the current situation bears a worrying resemblance to the collapse of John Law’s Mississippi scheme exactly 300 years ago. The key to understanding why this is so is because of the link forged between asset prices and fiat currencies. One fails, and they both fail, more rapidly than the most bearish bear might expect. Read More

01.30.20- More than 250,000 Chinese people will have coronavirus by early February, warns researcher
Ethan Huff

We’re just a few days away from month two of what’s shaping up to be quite the tumultuous new year, and researchers from the United Kingdom are now warning that the number of coronavirus cases is about to turn exponential.

In a model assessing the potential fallout from this highly contagious outbreak, this team of experts is expecting that more than 250,000 Chinese people will contract coronavirus by the turn of February – a number significantly higher than the roughly 6,200 cases that are currently being reported. Read More

01.29.20- Blink and you miss it: The U.S. yield curve inverts again
Karen Brettell

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A closely watched bond market phenomenon has again flashed yellow, but investors are loathe to give it much weight.

Yields on the 10-year Treasury note briefly fell below those of the 3-month bill early Tuesday for the first time since October, on concerns over the economic impact of the coronavirus. An inverted yield curve has historically been an indicator of looming recession as it tends to reflect worries over future growth among bond investors. Read More

01.28.20- The Black Swan Event Begins
Chris Vermeulen

As the Asian markets opened on late Sunday, traders expected a reactionary price move related to the threat of the Wuhan virus and the continued news of its spread.  The US Dow Jones futures markets opened close to -225 points lower on Sunday afternoon and were nearly -300 points lower within the first 25 minutes of trading.  Gold opened $10 higher and continued to rally to a level above $15 higher.

If this is early price activity, or a reactionary price move, related to fear of what may come, then the warnings signs are very clear that global traders and investors believe this virus outbreak may very well turn into a major Black Swan event. Read More

01.27.20- The Federal Government Has Devalued the Dollar Since 1971
Bill Bonner

Inflation is always and everywhere a rip-off.
– Bill Bonner

BALTIMORE, MARYLAND – The nice thing about inflation, at least from the feds’ point of view, is that it doesn’t leave fingerprints.

Today’s dollar, for example, is worth only three cents of the pre-1971 dollar. But who dunnit? Who stole 97 cents out of every dollar? Read More

01.25.20- Irrational fears of deflation
Alasdair Macleod

The benefits of a deflation of prices brought about by a combination of sound money and markets free from government intervention have been demonstrated to be the best economic environment, the denial of which in favour of inflationary financing has led to repeated monetary and systemic failures.

This article explains how this has come about and puts the record on deflation straight. The development of macroeconomic theory had to deny the benefits of a deflation of prices, unbelievably telling us we need higher prices to stimulate our consumption. Read More

01.24.20- Don’t Mess With the U.S. (Financially)
James Rickards

I’ve been documenting financial warfare in my articles for years, but it still doesn’t get the mainstream attention it deserves.

Because as you’ll see below, it can directly impact your wealth.

Financial warfare tools include account seizures and freezes, expulsion from global payment systems, secondary fines and penalties on banks that do business with targeted entities, embargoes, tariffs and many other impositions. Read More

01.23.20- The Corporate Debt Bubble Is A Train Wreck In Slow Motion
Brandon Smith

There are two subjects that the mainstream media seems specifically determined to avoid discussing these days when it comes to the economy - the first is the problem of falling global demand for goods and services; they absolutely refuse to acknowledge the fact that demand is going stagnant and will conjure all kinds of rationalizations to distract from the issue. The other subject is the debt bubble, the corporate debt bubble in particular. Read More

01.22.20- You’ll be surprised to see what investment has destroyed the S&P 500
Simon Black

The year was 1990, and the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse.  The Berlin Wall was still in the process of being destroyed, and East and West Germany were set to reunify later in the year.

Nelson Mandela was released from prison in February, and the South African government began talks to end Apartheid soon after.

Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in August. Read More

01.21.20- Swift Impeachment Trial and Acquittal Coming Up
Mike "Mish" Shedlock

01.20.20- Tech Expert Shares Five Predictions
for 2020
Jeff Brown

2019 was an incredible year for technology…

5G wireless networks went live in cities around the world on a weekly, sometimes daily, basis. Artificial intelligence accelerated faster than anybody predicted. And precision medicine technology is on the cusp of rewriting health care as we know it today.

This is such an exciting time to be a technology investor. And we have a lot to look forward to in 2020. Read More

01.18.20- Got Gold? - David Rosenberg Warns "We're Going To Have Helicopter Money"
Christoph Gisiger

David Rosenberg, Chief Economist & Strategist of Rosenberg Research, doesn’t believe in the sustainability of the stock market rally, and warns that investors may be disappointed at the end of the year. He is bullish on energy stocks - and predicts that the gold price will surge to $3000.

Mr. Rosenberg is also the author of Breakfast with Dave, a daily distillation of his economic and financial market insights. Read More

01.17.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Northam Declares State of Emergency in Virginia Because “armed militia groups plan to storm the Capitol”
Daisy Luther

The drama in Virginia has escalated again as Governor Ralph Northam declares an official State of Emergency before January 20th’s “Lobby Day” protests.

Citing violence that erupted in Charlottesville during a Unite the Right rally in 2017, Northam said that there are credible threats that “armed militia groups plan to storm the Capitol” during Monday’s rally. In an executive order,  he announced he is banning all weapons from Capitol Square for the day. Read More

01.16.20- Instability Rising: Why 2020 Will Be Different
Charles Hugh Smith

In 2020, increasing monetary and fiscal stimulus will be the equivalent of spraying gasoline on a fire to extinguish it.

Economically, the 11 years since the Global Financial Crisis of 2008-09 have been one relatively coherent era of modest growth, rising wealth/income inequality and coordinated central bank stimulus every time a crisis threatened to disrupt the domestic or global economy.

This era will draw to a close in 2020 and a new era of destabilization and uncertainty begins. Read More

01.15.20- 2020 - Year of Living Dangerously (Pt 2)
Jim Quinn

In Part One of this article I detailed my inability to predict the timing of events during this Fourth Turning, while maintaining the catalysts of debt, civic decay, and global disorder continue to drive the world towards a cliff.

“Every schoolchild will know what happened next, from the Oh-Ohs to the 2020s, as the Fourth Turning unfolded—but academics will surely debate how and why it came to pass. In his history, this great-great-grandson of today’s baby girl will reflect on what the Fourth Turning came to mean for his own time and generation. His history is not yet written. What will it be?” – Strauss & Howe Read More

01.14.20- 2020 - Year of Living Dangerously
Jim Quinn

“A shocking crime was committed on the unscrupulous initiative of few individuals, with the blessing of more, and amid the passive acquiescence of all.”  - Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

The shocking crime being committed during this century under the unscrupulous initiative of a few evil men is ongoing and no longer hidden from those willing to open their eyes and see the truth. As conspiracy theorists have proven to be right through the sacrifice of Snowden, Assange, and other patriots for truth, the Deep State psychopaths have double downed and are blatantly flaunting their power and control over the levers of government, finance and media. Read More

01.13.20- Surf’s Up!
Chris Martenson

The wave of change is finally here. Are you prepared to ride it?

Nothing seems right anymore.

In whichever direction we choose to look, things are unraveling at a quickening pace.

Welcome to the Fourth Turning; and with it, a profound loss of trust in institutions and government.

Such lack of social cohesion is a hallmark of a Fourth Turning. Sadly, it’s happening at a time when society desperately needs to pull together, set aside our differences, and make some really big decisions. Read More

01.11.20- Predictions for the 2020s
Dimitri Orlov

While many commentators see it fit to publish their predictions for the year ahead, I find a single year to be too fine-grained for any meaningful forecast. For me, plus or minus five years is about the right size of the error bars to place on any prediction with regard to timing, making it possible to time any major change to within a couple of decades. And it just so happens that another decade has gone by since I published my last set of predictions for the United States in the 2010s and it is therefore time to come up with a new set, for the 2020s. Read More

01.10.20- Sex, Drugs & Reality Distortion
Jamie Keech

It’s 1972, the US is withdrawing from Vietnam and the Godfather has just been released.

A Reed College dropout is on his way to meet a new student at his dorm-room to sell him a typewriter.

After knocking on the buyer’s door, eager to get the deal done, he tries the handle and steps inside only to find his would be buyer enthusiastically mid-coitus. Read More

01.09.20- And Now, for Something Entirely Different: Bolsheviks want to shut down Puerto Rico’s tax incentives
Joe Jarvis

[Editor’s note: This letter was written by Sovereign Man team member Joe Jarvis, who recently moved to Puerto Rico.] 

Local Puerto Ricans invariably tell me I’m overpaying on rent, and that I could have found a cheaper place to live.

I’m sure that’s true. But somehow I’m not upset about my gorgeous view over the ocean and private roof deck.

Beautiful beaches are right in front of me, along with three pools, a gym, and tennis courts. Read More

01.08.20- A New Gold Standard:
Orderly or Chaotic?
James Rickards

Over the past century, monetary systems change about every 30 to 40 years on average. Before 1914, the global monetary system was based on the classical gold standard.

Then in 1945, a new monetary system emerged at Bretton Woods. I was at Bretton Woods this past summer to commemorate its 75th anniversary.

Under that system, the dollar became the global reserve currency, linked to gold at $35 per ounce. In 1971 Nixon ended the direct convertibility of the dollar to gold. For the first time, the monetary system had no gold backing. Read More

01.07.20- How Money Printing Contributes to America’s Downward Spiral
Bill Bonner

One does not see malinvestment at the time of money printing. Price increases are delayed and uneven, due to the Cantillon Effect whereby the early receivers of new money are able to purchase goods and services at existing prices. Later receivers or those who do not receive the new money at all suffer higher prices and a reduction in their standards of living. Even then most people do not link higher retail prices with a previous expansion of the money supply.

It would be hard to invent a more effective method for the destruction of modern society.

– “The Hidden Link Between Fiat Money and the Increasing Appeal of Socialism” by Patrick Barron Read More

01.06.20- "World War 3? The US Has Crossed A Red Line... But It’s Not The One They Think"
Michael Every

“World War Three!” is trending on social media the day I return to work after two weeks off deliberately not reading any news for once: ironic given my reputation for being bearish about geopolitics. Markets, of course, have failed to react much: Middle-East bourses closed down 2-4% on Sunday, which is not exactly end of the world stuff; WTI futures are up around 3%, again not a real panic; while US 10-year yields were down from 1.94% intraday Thursday to 1.79% as of the Friday close - but the weak US ISM survey (47.2 headline; 46.8 new orders; 45.1 employment) could be to blame for that alone. Read More

01.04.20- How Trump Could Really Make US Industry Competitive Again
David Stockman

International Man: Trump’s America First economic policy seemed to help him win the 2016 election. He promised to renegotiate America’s trade deals and bring jobs back to the United States.

As president, Trump has used tariffs and other protectionist measures to try to reduce the trade deficit.

What do you think of Trump’s trade policies and tariffs? Read More

01.03.20- New Rules for the New Decade
Bill Bonner

My centre is giving way, my right is retreating, situation excellent, I am attacking. – Marshal Ferdinand Jean Marie Foch

BALTIMORE, MARYLAND – A new year! A new decade! And it’s going to be great.

Back in the 18th century, people went to insane asylums to laugh at the crazy people. Today, we only have to turn on the TV or read the news.

That’s progress! And it just gets better and better.

But we need to put it in perspective… Read More

01.02.20- The Cold, Hard Facts Which Prove That The Past Decade Was Actually Quite Awful For The U.S. Economy
Michael Snyder

If this is what “the good times” look like, how nightmarish are “the bad times” going to be?  In America today, more than 500,000 of us are homeless, about 40 million of us are living in poverty, 50 percent of all workers make less than $33,000 a year, and 70 percent of us have cried about money.  But at least the economy has been “growing”, right?  Well, in this article I would like to address that.  Even if you believe that the highly manipulated economic growth numbers that the government puts out are legitimate, they still show that we are in one of the worst economic stretches in all of U.S. history. Read More

01.01.20- Global Financial System Is A Big Rube Goldberg Machine
Bruce Wilds

While pondering the current economy that is becoming more of a conundrum every day, I stumbled upon an analogy I would like to share. The global economy is like a giant "Rube Goldberg" machine.It is a ridiculously complicated contraption built to perform what should normally be a simple task. Rube Goldberg machines often mimic the real world in that they are goal-oriented with many parts comingtogether to complete a task. Read More