A few short weeks ago, the economy seemed to be growing, the trade war looked winnable and the Mueller Report appeared to take presidential impeachment off the table. And then… The economy hit a rough patch. Auto sales are down and home sales are way down. This morning: Pending home sales fall, marking the 16th-straight […]
This Cycle’s Most Dangerous Bubble, In Three Charts
One of the lessons of the past few decades’ boom/bust cycles is that each financial bubble emerges in a different asset class. In the 1970s it was precious metals, in the 1980s junk bonds, in the 1990s tech stocks and in the 2000s mortgage-backed bonds. Today the only one of these with a reasonable chance […]
Top Ten Videos — May 29
Silver Shield: Dollar to silver ratio is crazy! … Chris Martenson: Out of control debt is outpacing economic growth … McAlvany: Gold/silver ratio is highest in 25 years … Bo Polny: A new financial era begins in 2019 … Lynette Zang on “hyperinflation and gold” […]
Stumbling Towards Chaos: All This Happened In Just One Week
Every week is eventful these days. But the most recent one stands out for sheer edge-of-the-abyss when-it-rains-it pours diversity. Some of the highlights: US stocks fell for the 5th straight week “logging the longest weekly losing streak since June 2011.” The US yield curve inverted decisively as long-term Treasury yields plunged. Past yield curve inversions […]
Financial Markets To Federal Reserve: Time To Start Cutting Rates
In late 2018 the US stock market tanked, in effect holding a gun to its own head and threatening to pull the trigger unless the Fed stopped raising interest rates. The Fed, painfully aware that an equities bull market is an existential threat in today’s hyper-leveraged world, quickly caved, promising no more rate increases if […]
Silver Speculators Say It’s Time To Start Buying
The gold futures market took a big step towards bullish — or at least neutral — in the past week. Speculators (usually wrong at big turning points) scaled back their long bets while commercials (usually right at turning points) reduced their net short positions. This is progress, but still leaves speculators long and commercials short. […]
Negative Interest Rates Spread To Mortgage Bonds
There are trillions of dollars of bonds in the world with negative yields – a fact with which future historians will find baffling. Until now those negative yields have been limited to the safest types of bonds issued by governments and major corporations. But this week a new category of negative-yielding paper joined the party: […]
Top Ten Videos — May 23
Peter Schiff: Will Tesla crash the corporate bond market? … Chris Martenson: We work for the company store … Gerald Celente: The woes of the status quo … Lynette Zang: How much gold is enough in a reset? … David McAlvany: US GDP growth would be negative without soaring debt … Alasdair Macleod: What will […]
The Terrifying Truth About Negative Interest Rates
Pushing interest rates below zero is both an act of desperation and something that in theory should have a huge, immediate impact of the behavior of borrowers and savers. The fact that negative rates have become the new normal in big parts of the world but haven’t caused the expected behavior change should scare the […]
Beef Just Lost Its Place In The Fast Food Burger World
Last year I read an article about the Impossible Burger, a plant-based patty that was supposed to rival the real thing. Intrigued, I called a friend who lives in a neighboring town and appreciates strange but environmentally cool things, and we met at a restaurant that served Impossible Burgers. They were good. Close to meat […]
Brutal Gold Futures Action Explains Last Week’s Big Price Decline
Just when it looked like gold futures — which still, unfortunately, dictate the price of physical precious metals — were ready to turn bullish, last week’s commitment of traders report (COT) revealed that commercial traders (usually right at big turns) had gone massively short while speculators (usually wrong at turning points) went aggressively long. That […]
Trump Is Turning Out To Be A Consequential President
The Donald’s personal failings make it hard to say nice things about his presidency. Yet contrary to most inside-the-Beltway expectations, he’s having an impact. Let’s start with abortion, something that divides the country in a visceral way, with one side seeing it as murder and the other side viewing its prohibition as the subjugation of […]
Top Ten Videos — May 16
Steve Keen: You don’t get asset prices at these levels without soaring leverage … Thom Hartmann: The coming war with Iran is yet another US false flag operation … Charles Hugh Smith: America’s next big crisis coming in June … Max Keiser: Gold would be $2,900 if it wasn’t being manipulated … […]
The Mixed Blessing Of Falling Birth Rates
The developed world is doing something unprecedented: It’s no longer reproducing. That’s great for the environment and very good for the work and housing prospects of the relative handful of kids that are being born (since fewer workers mean rising pay and fewer households mean cheaper real estate). But it’s bad for retirees who will […]
Tales From The Casino, Part 1: Funds That Bet On Volatility Might SPIKE Volatility, Crashing The Markets
It’s a measure of modern financial markets’ absurdity that bets on bets on bets have come to seem normal. Maybe acronyms like CLO and CDO make them sound scientific. Or maybe it’s the sense that if Wall Street’s “rocket scientists” create something it must be highly advanced and therefore beneficial for society. But in reality, […]
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