ALWAYS CONSULT YOUR INVESTMENT PROFESSIONAL BEFORE MAKING ANY INVESTMENT DECISION
March 16, 2024 | Unprecedented Speculative Option Trading
Hmmmm… next-level bats*#t. Gunjan Banerji, Wall Street Journal live markets coverage lead writer, joins ‘Squawk Box’ to discuss the options market around semiconductor and tech stocks, the impact of AI mania on the options market, the impact of Fed rate cuts, and more. Here is a direct video link.
March 15, 2024 | Soul of a Nation
QUESTION: You have said that a nation’s true wealth is not its gold but its people. Would you say that what makes the people different from nation to nation is their customs and culture? Is Soros’s Open Society destroying civilization by opening borders and undermining our culture? He is doing what Marx did and has no […]
March 15, 2024 | Banks are Fighting Proposals for Tougher Regulatory Rules
A battle is underway in the U.S. over new rules requiring higher equity capital for the banks. Enhanced equity capital protects the bank from insolvency in the event of a financial crisis. Bank lobbyists are fighting hard to keep capital requirements at the lowest possible level while regulators would like higher capital given the historical […]
March 15, 2024 | Reaping What We’ve Sown
Eleven years of near-zero interest rates (2009-2022) drove record debt and consumption, with a manic over-allocation to expensive real estate. Then, online shopping and work-from-home collapsed demand for commercial and office space, and central banks embarked on the most aggressive rate-tightening cycle in more than 40 years. As central banks hold tight, the highly […]
March 14, 2024 | Mainstream News is Committing Suicide
Virtually everyone I talk to thinks mainstream news is just propaganda. COVID drove a spike through the very heart and soul of the First Amendment. Even five years later, people generally respected the news. COVID appears to have been the death knell to mainstream news. This chart shows the results of Gallip[ Polls], and […]
March 14, 2024 | Ukraine Drone Attacks on Key Russian Refineries Boosts Crude Prices
GLOBAL ECONOMIC, POLITICAL & MILITARY UPDATE The hope that US inflation has been tamed was rebuked with the CPI data released yesterday. US CPI month over month rose 0.4% or 4.8% annualized, more than double the Fed’s target rate and the second month of hot data. Wage growth came in at up 4.3% from the […]
March 14, 2024 | Accidentally Funny CNBC Grapples With Costco Gold Sales
The legacy media has never understood gold, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that Costco and Walmart stocking precious metals — to booming demand — would seem a bit odd. But CNBC just outdid itself with a piece that can be divided into two parts: A befuddled but more or less factual accounting of the trends and numbers, followed […]
March 14, 2024 | Beware Animal Spirits and The Lag Effect
Since the October lows, stocks have roared back to record highs, and bonds have risen solidly as US 10yr Treasury yields have dropped from 5% to near 4% Will the bull run continue through the rest of 2024? It is an election year in America after all. Or, have the animal spirits carried assets to […]
March 14, 2024 | Higher Forever? Even Yellen Starts to Get it: Higher Inflation & Higher Yields Are Here to Stay
By now everyone sort of knows that inflation has been re-heating in a very disconcerting way for months, and that the inflation saga is far from over. There are all kinds of discussions about the future of inflation in the US, and it seems there is a rough common denominator forming: The future of inflation […]
March 13, 2024 | Welcome To The Third World, Part 2: When The Cops Don’t Come
Most Americans call or otherwise interact with the police very infrequently. So our sense of how that public service works may not be up to date. For instance, it’s generally believed that if you call the cops, they’ll respond. But that’s not always how it works these days. One 2023 study found big increases in […]
March 13, 2024 | Canada to Incorporate Social Scores in Banking
The Canadian banking system is set to be radicalized by open banking framework. Proponents are framing this as a way for banks to easily share information and access user data. The truth of the matter is that this is an opportunity to merge social standings with banking to provide government complete control over our […]
March 13, 2024 | This Kind of Housing Market
A house on my walking circuit sold on February 18 for $1,060,000 after 11 months on the market. It was initially listed in March 2023 for $1,798,000 and has been reduced nine times since. The property was relatively modest but updated with a water view and a legal rental suite. Property taxes are $8430 a […]
March 12, 2024 | Biden Proposes Largest Spending Package and American Taxpayer Burden in US History
The Biden Administration is outright destroying America through reckless spending. The Federal Reserve has warned that Biden’s current spending habits are robbing future generations of Americans. They cannot stablizie prices or make a dent in inflation due to the rising national debt. After his State of the Union address, Joe Biden unveiled his next […]
March 12, 2024 | Grantham: US Stocks Top 1 Percent Most Expensive in History
Jeremy Grantham’s latest update is available and worth reading on the GMO website. He points out that the current Shiller PE over 34 for the S&P 500 represents the most expensive 1% of all historical incidents. It has happened at a time when profit margins have also been at all-time highs and unemployment near all-time lows. […]
March 12, 2024 | Welcome To The Third World, Part 2: When The Cops Don’t Come
Most Americans call or otherwise interact with the police very infrequently. So our sense of how that public service works may not be up to date. For instance, it’s generally believed that if you call the cops, they’ll respond. But that’s not always how it works these days. One 2023 study found big increases in […]
March 11, 2024 | Immunity
The Constitution doesn’t directly discuss presidential immunity from criminal or civil lawsuits or immunity for other government officials. Instead, this privilege of Presidential has developed over time through the Supreme Court’s interpretation of Article II, Section 2, Clause 3: The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the […]
March 10, 2024 | Higher for Longer?
“There is a difference between you and me. We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back at us, you blinked.” -Batman, referencing Nietzsche in 2010’s Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths -My first thought on the quote: Think Jerome Powell and the FOMC The idea that “market expectations” tell us anything about […]
March 10, 2024 | P.T. Barnum Would Have Loved Bitcoin
Bitcoin mania looks likely to blow itself out at somewhat higher levels. The bitcoin ETF chart above suggests buyers will encounter significant resistance at 64.95, a Hidden Pivot target that lies 5% above Friday’s closing price. If this impediment gives way easily or is exceeded for two consecutive weeks on a closing basis, however, you […]
March 10, 2024 | Apartment Defaults Highest in a Decade
Nick connects the dots very well in this segment. Similar trends are happening in Canada, too. Apartment landlords around America are going into default on their mortgages at decade-high rates, suggesting that the Commercial Real Estate Crash is going to get even worse in 2024. Here is a direct video link.
March 10, 2024 | The Collapse of a Nation Takes 13 years
In law, it has been a maxim that bad facts make bad law. Every lawyer knows that. That is why the government will seek the worst case to expand the law and apply it to others. This legal maxim is certainly not new. All of those who go to law school are never taught […]
March 9, 2024 | Trading Desk Notes For March 9, 2024
Wicked price action may signal a shift in sentiment and positioning NVDA gapped higher on Friday’s opening and reached new All-Time Highs (up ~105% YTD) in the first hour of trading. It then dropped and closed below Wednesday and Thursday levels, creating a Daily Key Reversal down. NVDA’s market cap fell >$300 billion from Friday’s highs to lows. […]
March 9, 2024 | Tech Talk for Saturday March 9th 2024
The Bottom Line Another mixed week for performance by North American equity markets! Signs of investor uncertainty increased: the VIX Index advanced 12%, Gold bullion ETN (GLD) gained 4.3%, Gold Equity ETF (GDX) advanced 8.4% and Bitcoin jumped 9.9%.
March 8, 2024 | Apple Struggles with Slumping Sales in China
China and the iPhone are closely linked, as sales in that country are a key to Apple’s success. China is going through an economic slump which shows up in sales of Apple’s most successful product, the iPhone. Recently competitors in China have been growing sales faster than Apple. Is a China sales slump for the […]
March 8, 2024 | The Coming New Monetary System
QUESTION: Hello Martin, been reading your passages for a few months now. I had a question for you. What currency do you think BRICS will use to settle trades in the future and if that he bitcoin could be a viable option? Since you don’t see the USD being the world currency by 2035. […]
March 8, 2024 | The Public Bank That Wasn’t: New Jersey’s Excursion into Public Banking
In 2017, Phil Murphy, a former Goldman Sachs executive, made the establishment of a public, state-owned bank a centerpiece issue during his run for New Jersey governor. He regularly championed public banking in speeches, town halls and campaign commercials. He won the race, and the nation’s second state-owned bank following the stellar model of the Bank […]