John Rubino Substack - Japan has been a big topic in this newsletter because it illustrates the no-win situation in which wildly overindebted countries eventually find themselves. Here are two articles that illustrate the point: How a Country Goes Bankrupt, In 10 Steps Japan Is In That Box Now For The Death Spiral   Confronted with both a plunging […]

John Rubino Substack - The Paris Summer Olympics may have started a trend: Sodom And Gomorrah Set To Host 2028 Olympics (Babylon Bee) – In keeping with the Olympics’ commitment to sexual violence and Satan worship, the International Olympic Committee announced today that the 2028 games would be held in the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah. “They’re a natural fit for […]

John Rubino Substack - The next BRICS meeting is scheduled for October, in Russia. In the meantime, a lot is happening on the de-dollarization front. Some recent news: NATO just took Russian assets and gave them to Ukraine: Not surprisingly… Russia says it’s working with a group of countries to build a platform that doesn’t need the dollar (Business Insider) […]

John Rubino Substack - First, the FAANG stocks (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google) were going to rise forever. Then they morphed into the “Magnificent 7” which many believe will ride the AI boom to infinity and beyond. Either way, the result is a wildly unbalanced market (and economy) supported by a tiny group of multi-trillion-dollar companies. We’ve seen […]

John Rubino Substack - Headline economic stats like GDP continue to look pretty good. But the list of reliable indicators screaming “imminent recession” continues to expand. Some of the latest: Un-Inverted Yield Curve   An inverted yield curve (where short-term interest rates are higher than long-term rates) is a well-known recession signal. But it really starts flashing when it un-inverts, i.e., when long-term […]

John Rubino Substack - Let’s start with the fact that the average American can’t afford the average house. Not even close: Houses have been unaffordable for a while, but for a while, “investors” — i.e., private equity companies with access to cheap credit — took up the slack, sometimes buying entire neighborhoods and converting the houses to rentals. Now […]

John Rubino Substack - Many people recognize the similarities between today’s world and that of the 1970s. But few understand the potential chaos that implies for a system this overleveraged. Charles Hugh Smith just posted an article that explains the impact on investors. Here’s an excerpt: Twisters on the Horizon: Is This Decade a Re-Make of ‘That 70s Show’? If […]

HoweStreet.com Radio - Today’s Stock Market much like 2000 dot com bust set up

John Rubino Substack - Best-selling financial writer and former investment banker Nomi Prins just posted a primer on nuclear power (and, by implication, the uranium mining stocks). Here’s an excerpt: The New Gold Rush: Unlock Uranium’s Soaring Demand Nuclear energy is the “Switzerland” of energy sources. It is increasingly popular with both sides of the political spectrum for several reasons. First, nuclear energy is […]

John Rubino Substack - Japan appears to have entered the inevitable fiat currency death spiral, where interest rates (and interest costs) rise while the currency falls. Fix one problem and the other gets worse, until the system breaks. Here, from March 2023, is a longer explanation:   How a Country Goes Bankrupt, In 10 Steps   The past few […]

John Rubino Substack - A friend just emailed about the Trump assassination attempt, predicting that it guarantees his election in November. I tentatively agreed, and responded with a story: You’re too young to remember Ronald Reagan. But back in the 1980s, his political honeymoon was fading and his approval ratings were dropping. Then someone shot him in the chest, […]

John Rubino Substack - Once you understand the concept of the microbiome, it’s easy to see the problem with pesticide-laden food: Pesticides are poisons designed to kill small lifeforms, and ingesting such poisons risks wiping out or disrupting the good bacteria that keep us alive and functional. The obvious solution is to eat only organic produce and meat. But that’s […]

Juggling Dynamite - In the second quarter of 2024, big tech companies drove the S&P 500 up 4.3%, while the Russell 2000 index of economically representative small and midsize stocks fell 3.6%. The five most expensive S&P 500 companies now make up a record 29% of the US market capitalization–the narrowest concentration since 1965 and more extreme than […]

John Rubino Substack - US financial headlines remain in Goldilocks territory (prompting all those “Why don’t Americans know how good they have it??” diatribes from the MSM). But under the surface, the drumbeat of negative data continues. Today, let’s consider jobs and real estate: Jobs   Official reports of plentiful jobs and low unemployment are possible because the government is […]

John Rubino Substack - Deciding to store gold and/or silver offshore is just the first step in a long process. Choosing a country and a storage service, then contracting to buy or ship the metal, are all make-or-break decisions. And very few newcomers to offshore storage understand everything. So here’s a just-released article from offshore specialist Nestmann Group that answers the […]

John Rubino Substack - As this newsletter’s archives expand, it’s becoming clear that some posts didn’t age well at all. They should stay buried. But others were early and have actually become more relevant as things unfold. So once a week I’m going to republish one of the latter posts The following (from July 28, 2023) needs no explanation in light […]

John Rubino Substack - FBI Firearm Training Facility Replaces Paper Targets With Copies Of The Constitution Babylon Bee, Washington, D.C. — In a completely innocuous and in no way concerning recent update, the FBI Training Facility for Firearms and Small Weaponry has replaced all of its paper targets with copies of the Constitution of the United states. According to […]

John Rubino Substack - Among the keys to a long, healthy life are exercise, sunshine, and not smoking. But the most important of all might be maintaining a balanced microbiome. Here’s a quick primer: The term “microbiome” refers to the trillions of bacteria, viruses, fungi, and other microscopic living things that exist mainly inside our intestines and on our […]

John Rubino Substack - Not that we need any more scary statistics, but here’s one that might be worth watching. From the Brave browser’s AI summarizer: Government liquidity index The government liquidity index is a metric that measures the ease or difficulty of trading in government securities, such as U.S. Treasury bonds. It is a gauge of deviations in yields from a […]

John Rubino Substack - On the list of things that might disrupt our increasingly fragile financial system, cyberattacks have always been up there with pandemics, real estate busts, war, and inflation. But those other things have, in one form or another, been happening while cyber disruptions have been limited to small-time extortion and the occasional data breach. That might […]

John Rubino Substack - I just got this offer from a credit card: But it’s not just credit cards: Buy Now, Pay Later Craze Coming To Apple Pay (Zero Hedge) – iPhones and iPads will soon be integrated with Affirm’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) feature. This product will soon be available for Apple Pay users. “This will enable […]

John Rubino Substack - We all sense that our basic rights are under attack, but the nature of the enemy and the weapons at their disposal aren’t always clear. Here’s a video that spells out the who, what, and how of the New World Order. A few bullet points: Property rights are the bedrock of a free society. Wealthy […]

John Rubino Substack - Over the past couple of decades, the US has invaded and/or destabilized multiple countries — including Iraq, Libya, and Syria — for accepting currencies other than the dollar for oil. That’s how big a deal the petrodollar was for the Empire. But now it’s over: Saudi Arabia ends petrodollar agreement (Kitco News) – The established […]

John Rubino Substack - “Getting your affairs in order” requires a lot of sometimes tricky decisions, the biggest and potentially thorniest of which is choosing someone to make sure your assets go where they’re supposed to. The lucky among us will have someone who’s trustworthy and willing to take on the job, but for many others it’s not so […]

John Rubino Substack - There are maybe 10 currently serving US politicians who have managed to avoid looking corrupt, stupid, senile, and/or mindlessly bloodthirsty in recent years. One of the most interesting of that tiny group is Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie, a consistent libertarian who is anti-war (including the latest one in the Middle East), opposed to foreign aid, in favor […]