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- Post #12,701
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- Apr 5, 2024 7:40pm Apr 5, 2024 7:40pm
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
- Post #12,702
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- Edited 7:27pm Apr 6, 2024 6:23pm | Edited 7:27pm
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LOOK AT THAT GREAT JOBS REPORT
Guest Post by E.J. Antoni
For convenience, here’s all the info on the Mar jobs report in a single thread – sorry to be the bearer of bad news, especially regarding American citizens losing so much ground in this economy…https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcx7CmXkAAee-W.png
The headline numbers once again look good with over 300k payrolls added and the employment number from the household survey rising even faster, but what kinds of jobs are being created? Turns out they’re all part-time:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcoYhIXQAAE6Ij.png
And this isn’t new – it’s a continuation of a long trend: full-time employment is lower today than Feb ’23 w/ all of the net job creation since then being part-time work:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKco1tdXYAAmDVi.png
Why the surge in part-time employment? Many Americans have been laid off and replaced 1 full-time job with 2 or 3 part-time ones; people are also picking up additional jobs to make ends meet in a cost-of-living crisis; this has caused an unprecedented divergence between the household and establishment surveys, since the latter double count individuals w/ multiple jobs while the former survey shows a net loss of jobs since Aug ’23:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcpoMnWYAAtzeQ.png
The number of people with/ multiple jobs jumped again in Mar but remember that this figure only increases when someone gets a 2nd job; if you’re already working 2 gigs and pick up a 3rd, you’re not counted again – at least not here; but you ARE counted again in the nonfarm payrolls…https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcxdS8WIAA3SBy.png
With the shift to so much part-time work, average hours worked per week has trended down for almost 3 years and is below the pre-pandemic average; your hourly wage raise doesn’t do much good when it’s combined w/ a cut in your hours:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcp370XAAAJQgf.png
Another disturbing datum point: too many jobs are in gov’t; the economy isn’t adding enough private-sector jobs to support several workers gov’t is hiring; Mar’s ratio was about 3:1, nowhere near sustainable, especially since those private-sector jobs were all part-time, generating less tax revenue than average full-time job:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcqjuqWoAAb3EB.png
Let’s break down the annual change in the private sector for a closer look: we find the fastest growing sector was health care, which is dominated by gov’t; most of the hiring over the last year came directly or indirectly from gov’t – even the construction jobs were mostly financed w/ gov’t guaranteed loans on projects that aren’t profitable (which is why the private sector wasn’t undertaking those projects)…https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcqsdqWIAAk4VE.png
We’d rather see good-paying blue-collar manufacturing jobs taking the lead, but that sector has been anemic: employment is up a mere 0.1% since Jan ’23, having added zero jobs in Mar ’24:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcruyEWIAAjgv9.png
And while it’s good to see the labor force participation rate climb, we’re still way below the pre-pandemic rate, and that’s hiding the true level of unemployment by excluding millions of workers from the calculation:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcsFCaWsAAnZGO.png
You can see that the labor force is clearly below its pre-pandemic trend:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcsYCBXIAAdPuW.png
We see the same thing with the employment-to-population ratio:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcsfaoWgAEp9gr.png
As well as the number of nonfarm payrolls from the establishment survey:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcsnKWWsAApZc4.png
And yet again in the employment level from the household survey: millions below the trend:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcsvlFWkAAG-N2.png
The Bureau of Labor Statistics even has a category of people called “not in the labor force” and it’s about 5 million above the pre-pandemic level, and way above the pre-pandemic trend which had begun trending down in about Set ’18:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKctaiYWIAAm3fr.png
So, if you account for the millions of people who are clearly missing from the labor market today (and therefore are not employed), you can calculate that the unemployment rate isn’t 3.8% but between 6.5% and 7.7% depending on which dataset and methodology you prefer to use:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKctfprXIAAbFN8.png
But who is getting these jobs? It’s not native-born Americans, but foreigner workers – the former lost 651k jobs over the last 12 months, while employment of foreigners rose by 1.3 million:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcu-9hXEAEgMH2.png
And again, this is the continuation of a trend where Americans have been completely left behind in this economy; foreign-born employment is not only several million above its pre-pandemic level but is even above its pre-pandemic trend, while native-born Americans have made no progress in 4 years – in fact, they’ve gone backwards; a quick note on the different axes here: this chart was constructed so that the different values on the left and right axes are proportional; that means if both groups had the same rate of increase, the lines would have the same slope; also important is that these are not seasonally adjusted datasets so month-over-month changes are as apples-to-oranges comparison in most cases, while year-over-year changes do not have that issue; you can still create a seasonal adjustment yourself, it’s just not provided by BLS; lastly, some have tried to blame the decline of native-born employment on Americans retiring, but that would only be enough of a change to slow the rate of growth, not turn it into decline:https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKcvUtRWUAAwI7Y.png
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IMPORTANT NOTE FROM BRUCE WARREN MARGOLESE
Please CLICK on the post below which is number 12,090 and read what Martin A. Armstrong had to say about President Biden.
Then please read my post number 12,703 of April 6, 2024, at 6:46 PM.
You will get an updated analysis of where things are not the lies that the world has been fed in advance of the most important world events of the last 60-plus years when JFK was assassinated on November 22, 1963.
This led to Richard Milhous Nixon and Henry Kissinger telling President Charles DeGale of France and the world to hold on to your American printed dollars because from here on in we will keep your Gold as we only back printed US dollars with our WORD !!!
Nixon shock - Wikipedia
PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ HOW THEY CHANGED OUR WORLD AND ALL OF OUR LIVES.
The Nixon shock refers to the effect of a series of economic measures, including wage and price freezes, surcharges on imports, and the unilateral cancellation of the direct international convertibility of the United States dollar to gold, taken by United States President Richard Nixon in 1971 in response to increasing inflation.[1][2]
Although Nixon's actions did not formally abolish the existing Bretton Woods system of international financial exchange, the suspension of one of its key components effectively rendered the Bretton Woods system inoperative.[3] While Nixon publicly stated his intention to resume direct convertibility of the dollar after reforms to the Bretton Woods system had been implemented, all attempts at reform proved unsuccessful. By 1973, the current regime based on freely floating fiat currencies de facto replaced the Bretton Woods system for other global currencies.[4]
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US Dollar Index (DXY)
USD/GBP exchange rate
USD/Canadian dollar exchange rate
EUR/USD (inverted) exchange rate
USD/JPY exchange rate
USD/SEK exchange rate
USD/CHF exchange rate
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Price of gold 1915–2022
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...price.webp.png
Price of oil 1946–2022
Background[edit]
See also: Closure of the Suez Canal (1967–1975)
Bretton Woods system[edit]
In 1944, representatives from 44 nations met in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to develop a new international monetary system that came to be known as the Bretton Woods system. Conference attendees had hoped that this new system would "ensure exchange rate stability, prevent competitive devaluations, and promote economic growth".[5] It was not until 1958 that the Bretton Woods system became fully operational. Countries now settled their international accounts in dollars that could be converted to gold at a fixed exchange rate of $35 per ounce, which was redeemable by the U.S. government. Thus, the United States was committed to backing every dollar overseas with gold, and other currencies were pegged to the dollar.
For the first years after World War II, the Bretton Woods system worked well. With the Marshall Plan, Japan and Europe were rebuilding from the war, and countries outside the US wanted dollars to spend on American goods—cars, steel, machinery, etc. Because the U.S. owned over half the world's official gold reserves—574 million ounces at the end of World War II—the system appeared secure.[6]
However, from 1950 to 1969, as Germany and Japan recovered, the US share of the world's economic output dropped significantly, from 35% to 27%. Furthermore, a negative balance of payments, growing public debt incurred by the Vietnam War, and monetary inflation by the Federal Reserve caused the dollar to become increasingly overvalued in the 1960s.[6]
Criticism and decline[edit]
In France, the Bretton Woods system was called "America's exorbitant privilege"[7] as it resulted in an "asymmetric financial system" where non-US citizens "see themselves supporting American living standards and subsidizing American multinationals". As American economist Barry Eichengreen summarized: "It costs only a few cents for the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to produce a $100 bill, but other countries had to pony up $100 of actual goods to obtain one".[7] In February 1965, French President Charles de Gaulle announced his intention to exchange its U.S. dollar reserves for gold at the official exchange rate.[8]
By 1966, non-US central banks held $14 billion, while the United States had only $13.2 billion in gold reserves. Of those reserves, only $3.2 billion was able to cover foreign holdings as the rest was covering domestic holdings.[9]
By 1971, the money supply had increased by 10%.[10] In May 1971, West Germany left the Bretton Woods system, unwilling to sell further Deutsche Mark for dollars.[11] In the following three months, this move strengthened its economy. Simultaneously, the dollar dropped 7.5% against the Deutsche Mark.[11] Other nations began to demand redemption of their dollars for gold. Switzerland redeemed $50 million in July.[11] France acquired $191 million in gold.[11] On August 5, 1971, the United States Congress released a report recommending devaluation of the dollar, to protect the dollar against "foreign price-gougers".[11] On August 9, 1971, as the dollar dropped in value against European currencies, Switzerland left the Bretton Woods system.[11] The pressure began to intensify on the United States to leave Bretton Woods.
Nixon response[edit]
At the time, the U.S. also had an unemployment rate of 6.1% (August 1971)[12][notes 1] and an inflation rate of 5.84% (1971).[13] To combat these problems, Nixon consulted Federal Reserve chairman Arthur Burns, incoming Treasury Secretary John Connally, and Paul Volcker, then Undersecretary for International Monetary Affairs and future Federal Reserve Chairman.
On the afternoon of Friday, August 13, 1971, Burns, Connally, and Volcker, along with twelve other high-ranking White House and Treasury advisors, met secretly with Nixon at Camp David. There was great debate about what Nixon should do, but ultimately Nixon, relying heavily on the advice of the self-confident Connally, decided to break up Bretton Woods by announcing the following actions on August 15:[14][15][16]
- Nixon directed Treasury Secretary Connally to suspend, with certain exceptions, the convertibility of the dollar into gold or other reserve assets, ordering the gold window to be closed such that foreign governments could no longer exchange their dollars for gold.
- Nixon issued Executive Order 11615 (under the Economic Stabilization Act of 1970), imposing a 90-day freeze on wages and prices to counter inflation. This was the first time the U.S. government had enacted wage and price controls since World War II.
- An import surcharge of 10 percent was set to ensure that American products would not be at a disadvantage because of the expected fluctuation in exchange rates.
Speaking on television on Sunday, August 15, when American financial markets were closed, Nixon said the following:
The third indispensable element in building the new prosperity is closely related to creating new jobs and halting inflation. We must protect the position of the American dollar as a pillar of monetary stability around the world. In the past 7 years, there has been an average of one international monetary crisis every year… I have directed Secretary Connally to suspend temporarily the convertibility of the dollar into gold or other reserve assets, except in amounts and conditions determined to be in the interest of monetary stability and the best interests of the United States.
Now, what is this action—which is very technical—what does it mean for you? Let me lay to rest the bugaboo of what is called devaluation. If you want to buy a foreign car or take a trip abroad, market conditions may cause your dollar to buy slightly less. But if you are among the overwhelming majority of Americans who buy American-made products in America, your dollar will be worth just as much tomorrow as it is today. The effect of this action, in other words, will be to stabilize the dollar.[17]
Impact and aftermath[edit]
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The Nixon shock has been widely considered to be a political success, but an economic failure for bringing on the 1973–1975 recession, the stagflation of the 1970s, and the instability of floating currencies.[citation needed]
Political effect[edit]
Politically, Nixon's actions were a great success. The American public believed the government was rescuing them from price gougers and a foreign-caused exchange crisis.[18][19] The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 33 points the next day, its biggest daily gain ever at that point, and the New York Times editorial read, "We unhesitatingly applaud the boldness with which the President has moved."[6][20]
Economic effect and legacy[edit]
By December 1971, the import surcharge was dropped as part of a general revaluation of the Group of Ten (G-10) currencies, which under the Smithsonian Agreement were thereafter allowed 2.25% devaluations from the agreed exchange rate. According to Douglas Irwin in World Trade Review's report "The Nixon Shock After Forty Years: The Import Surcharge Revisited", for several months, U.S. officials could not get other countries to agree to a formal revaluation of their currencies.[citation needed]
In March 1973, the fixed exchange rate system became a floating exchange rate system.[21] The currency exchange rates no longer were governments' principal means of administering monetary policy.
Under the floating rate system, during the 1970s, the dollar plunged by a third. Further, the Nixon shock unleashed enormous speculation against the dollar.
The German Mark appreciated significantly after it was allowed to float in May 1971. It forced Japan's central bank to intervene significantly in the foreign exchange market to prevent the yen from increasing in value. Within two days August 16–17, 1971, Japan's central bank had to buy $1.3 billion to support the dollar and keep the yen at the old rate of ¥360 to the dollar. Japan's foreign exchange reserves rapidly increased: $2.7 billion (30%) a week later and $4 billion the following week.
Still, this large-scale intervention by Japan's central bank could not prevent the depreciation of the US dollar against the yen. France also was willing to allow the dollar to depreciate against the franc, but not allow the franc to appreciate against gold.[citation needed]
Even much later, in 2011, Paul Volcker expressed regret over the abandonment of Bretton Woods: "Nobody's in charge," Volcker said. "The Europeans couldn't live with the uncertainty and made their currency and now that's in trouble."[6]
- Post #12,703
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- Edited 7:38pm Apr 6, 2024 6:46pm | Edited 7:38pm
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
The Burning Platform
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Biden 8% Approval Means Panic & War
By Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com
Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong has new data on President Biden’s approval numbers. Nearly two years ago, President Biden’s real job approval rating in America was just 12%. More than one year ago, the real Biden approval number slipped to 9.5% (and stayed there) according to Armstrong’s world renowned “Socrates” predictive computer program. Now, Biden’s rating tumbled again. Armstrong says, “It is basically hovering around 7.5% to 8% at this stage.
I know this goes against the mainstream media, but if you look at Google, it is really politically motivated. . . . The other number you need to look at is the confidence in government, and it is at 28%. . . . This number is unheard of since World War II. (I have another confidential data miner source who backs up Armstrong’s numbers, including the latest 8% job approval number, with nearly identical Biden job approval numbers going back two years. So, yes, there are two solid sources for Biden’s true approval rating.)
You will never see Biden’s real numbers on the Lying Legacy Media (LLM), but everybody at the top of the D.C. swamp knows how weak Biden is.
What does this record-low Biden approval rating mean? Armstrong explains, “What you have to be concerned about is our computer is showing a massive panic cycle in September. This is very curious because the Democrat convention is August 19th. . . . At that convention, they can just draft somebody. That has been the rumor for quite some time. They know Biden is quite pathetic. The Neocons like him because they can do whatever they want. The climate change people are doing the same thing. . .
The President is supposed to act as a referee in the cabinet, and he’s not even there 40% of the time. The collapse in government is because all these agencies are just doing the wrong thing, and nobody is standing in between. You’ve got the State Department threatening World War III. . . .The problem is a government will fail when you can’t sell the new debt to pay off the old. That’s when a default comes. . . . That’s how a default takes place. You have these Neocons in the State Department constantly trying to create WWIII. Why would you buy a 10-year bond in the face of war? Interest rates always go up in wartime. We don’t have a President running as referee between all these agencies.”
Armstrong says, “Everything is pointing towards war.”
Armstrong sees an important turn date coming up and explains, “If we don’t have war, the Fed may do a rate cut after May . . . . I don’t see Powell doing a rate cut at this stage. Our computers see the economy expanding into May, and the ideal peak is May 7th. After that, we are going to move into a recessionary atmosphere up to 2028. It is an inflationary period, and inflation will be rising above economic growth, and that is stagflation.”
On record high gold prices, Armstrong says, “Gold prices go up when confidence in government goes down. . . . I expect the gold price will be at least around the $5,000 per ounce level by 2027 or 2028.”
There is much more in the 50-minute interview.
Biden 8% Approval Means Panic & War – Martin Armstrong
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, who will preview his “Mid-year Seminar” in London at the end of May for 4.2.24.
(To Donate to USAWatchdog.com Click Here)
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Interview: Biden 8% Approval Means Panic & War | Armstrong Economics
- Post #12,704
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- Apr 6, 2024 10:32pm Apr 6, 2024 10:32pm
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
SATURDAY, APRIL 06, 2024
Positive Trading Psychology - I: Flourishing
https://blogger.googleusercontent.co...Psychology.jpg
In the next several posts, I will outline an approach to trading psychology based upon recent research in the field of "positive psychology". I believe this can be a game-changer for many traders and trading teams.
To use the analogy of positive psychology's founding researcher, Dr. Martin Seligman, the goal of positive psychology is not to go from -5 to 0, but to go from +2 to +5. This means that feeling good and performing well is not enough. We are meant to "flourish" by amplifying what is already positive. According to Dr. Seligman's research, there are five dimensions of flourishing, known by their acronym PERMA:
1) Positive Emotion
2) Engagement
3) Relationships
4) Meaning
5) Accomplishments
As the Positive Psychology site explains, flourishing is not something we have or don't have. Rather, it's a process that can wax and wane at various points in our lives.
Think about what this means: We think about trading processes, and we might even follow personal processes regarding what/how we eat, our sleep and exercise, etc. How many of us, however, explicitly follow processes of flourishing in how we approach markets? Consider a simple PERMA review for traders:
1) Are your reviews and research efforts generating positive emotion, by focusing on opportunities, learning, and insights?
2) Are you constructively engaged with markets? With other traders? With learning? Are you focused and operating in a "flow state", or are you distracted and jumping from screen to screen and idea to idea?
3) Who is mentoring you and how are you learning? Who are you mentoring and how are you improving them and cementing your ideas? What are you doing to nourish your friendships and personal relationships, and how are they nourishing you? If there is no nourishing, there can be no flourishing.
4) What is meaningful to you in your trading beyond short-term P/L? What in markets captures your interests and passions and helps you find unique opportunity? What is meaningful in your life outside of trading that keeps you emotionally and spiritually nourished?
5) What have you accomplished recently and how can you build upon it? What have you learned from the accomplishments of others? How are you celebrating your accomplishments and who are you celebrating with? How are your achievements in all areas of life keeping you energized and focused?
We develop a flourishing life by focusing on flourishing each day. Each day is a miniature lifetime. We are born in the morning and by nighttime we lose energy and lie down to rest. In between, our challenge is to live the most meaningful and successful life possible. It's great to cope and correct our mistakes, but the key question is: How can we flourish today and be all that we're capable of being?
Further Reading:
What is Your Emotional P/L?
A Flourishing Assessment
.
Posted by Brett Steenbarger, Ph.D.at 8:17 AM
- Post #12,705
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- Apr 7, 2024 10:09am Apr 7, 2024 10:09am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
Gold’s silent comeback and the middle class rebound
The middle class has been stuck in a rut – psychologically if not economically – for years, and they’re not afraid to admit it. Last year’s upset victory for Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential race was a manifest token of middle class angst. Opinion polls have shown that many of the anxieties expressed by the middle class last year are still a concern for them this year. In other words, not much has changed since a year ago. There are some strong indications that the middle class outlook will change for the better in the coming months, however, as we’ll discuss in this commentary.
Ask the typical middle class wage earner if they think they’re economic prospects will improve in the year ahead, however, and you’ll likely receive a cynical response. If there was any doubt that Middle America’s economic prospects haven’t improved much since last year, the following graph will lay them to rest. Shown here is the Middle Class Index (M.C.I.), a share price composite of several leading companies that cater to a largely middle class customer base. The components of this index include JC Penny (JCP), Ford (F), Dollar General (DG), Wendy’s (WEN), Wal-Mart (WMT), and Kroger (KR).
https://blogger.googleusercontent.co...iddleclass.jpg
If the above graph is any indication of middle class consumption patterns, then middle income Americans haven’t exactly set the world on fire with their spending. The implication of the M.C.I. is that while middle class spending has certainly increased over the last several years, it has essentially flat-lined on a 3-year basis. While there is admittedly a danger in reading too much into such a simplified overview of middle class spending, it’s likely not far from the truth to assume that middle class Americans aren’t making much progress. At least, that’s how they feel based on the trend of the Middle Class Index.
So the question is, “Will the economic prospects ever improve for the middle class?” While many would respond with a bleak “Never!” there is actually a good indication that the year ahead will witness some solid improvement. Consider the next chart exhibit, which highlights the prospects for the upper middle class (i.e. individuals who earn in excess of $75K/year). The Upper Middle Class Index shown here is a stock price average of several companies which cater mainly to the upper middle, including Target (TGT), Starbucks (SBUX), BMW (BMWYY), Apple (AAPL), and Ruth’s Chris (RUTH).
https://blogger.googleusercontent.co...ppermiddle.jpg
What this graph suggests is that, in contrast to the middle class, upper middle class consumers have increased their spending over the last year. In just the last few months alone the Upper Middle Class Index has trended decisively higher as luxury spending among upper middle and upper income consumers has been buoyant. The message of this indicator is that the upper middle class is in much better shape than the middle class.
There is another takeaway from our discussion of the Upper Middle Class Index, however. Historically, economic improvement following a major downturn like the last recession proceeds from the highest economic classes to the lowest. It’s much like a freight train when it starts rolling from a standstill; the engine moves first, then the cars closest to the engines, and so on until at last the final cars begin moving forward. The upper class is always the first to benefit from an increase in credit and money supply, then the upper middle, then the middle, and finally the lower class. Like a train, economic momentum takes time to build up but when it finally becomes established it tends to be self-sustaining.
The fact that the Upper Middle Class Index is increasing is a positive indication for the middle class, for it suggests that the increased spending patterns of the upper class of recent years have finally spilled over into the upper middle class. Eventually the middle class will eventually follow the lead of the upper middle, as is always the case.
One sign that the U.S. economy may be on the cusp of truly breaking out is found in the graph illustrating the rate of change in M2 money velocity. This is one way of measuring the demand for money. Money demand, as measured by the ratio of M2 money stock to nominal GDP, has been extremely high by historical standards for the last several years. In fact, the demand for cash has been extraordinary since the 2008 crash, as investors have feared a recurrence of the crisis years. The inverse of this measure is the velocity of M2 money (nominal GDP divided by M2). Velocity remains near multi-decade lows in reflection of the public’s massive demand for cash; however, it shows signs that it may be reversing.
The following graph, courtesy of the St. Loius Fed (https://fred.stlouisfed.org), shows the year-over-year change in M2 money stock. As you can see, it’s trending gradually higher and is close to entering positive territory for the first time since Q1 2010, when the combined impact of Federal Reserve and U.S. government stimulus was at its highest following the Great Recession. This is also a sign that the perennial problem of low inflation is gradually reversing as inflation slowly, almost imperceptibly, makes its return.
https://blogger.googleusercontent.co...0/velocity.gif
Another indication that things are about to improve for the middle class is, perhaps surprisingly, the price of gold. Gold serves two primary functions in today’s economy. The first is as a reflection of how much fear exists among investors as it pertains to the future outlook. The gold price is basically one way of gauging how much confidence stakeholders (producers, consumers, and investors) have in the future prospects for business.
More than this, gold is also a measure of future inflation expectations. When the economy was still quite fragile between the years 2009 and 2011, investors placed a high premium on gold ownership as reflected in runaway gold prices. When it became clear in late 2011, however, that the U.S. recovery was gaining traction, gold lost much of its luster as a safe haven and it became less desirable for investors to commit the bulk of their investment capital to it. Risk assets instead became more attractive, undermining the demand for gold.
Since last year, however, gold has embarked on a “silent comeback,” effectively ending a four-year bear market. (See the SPDR Gold Shares ETF chart below for illustration.) It has been consolidating its gains in recent months as it prepares to continue its long-term rebound. The going has been slow for the most part, mainly because inflation has been slow to return and equities continue to steal some of the yellow metal’s thunder. If the M2 velocity chart shown above is any indication, however, then inflation should slowly increase in the coming years. This would certainly brighten gold’s longer-term prospects and make gold ownership more attractive to the average investor once again. A moderate amount of inflation, besides boosting gold’s lure, would also help the middle class to recover even more.
https://blogger.googleusercontent.co..._/s400/gld.gif
In the final analysis, a full-fledged middle class economic revival has been talked about and anticipated for years, and its failure to arrive has been frustrating. Its manifestation is long overdue, however, and while it has been slow in coming the indicators discussed here bode well for the middle class in the months ahead. History shows that sustained improvement in the upper middle class always eventually spills over to the next level down, which is good news for Middle America in 2018.
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- Apr 7, 2024 10:18am Apr 7, 2024 10:18am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
PLEASE WATCH - 40 Minutes and 55 Seconds ...
Marc Faber - Short U.S. Markets and Buy Gold (youtube.com)
- Post #12,707
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- Edited 8:00pm Apr 7, 2024 7:02pm | Edited 8:00pm
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Russia Finally Says 'Nyet' To Continued North Korea Sanctions Enforcement
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BY TYLER DURDEN
SUNDAY, APR 07, 2024 - 06:40 PM
Authored by Joseph D. Terwilliger via AntiWar.com,
Last week, a United Nations Security Council resolution to extend the mandate for the UN Panel of Experts on DPRK sanctions was vetoed by the Russian Federation, effectively disbanding the primary enforcement mechanism for the nine rounds of sanctions that have been imposed on the DPRK since 2006, in response to their repeated nuclear and ICBM tests.
On October 9th, 2006, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) conducted its first successful test of a nuclear weapon. In response to this, the United Nations Security Council unanimously passed resolution 1718, condemning the DPRK for the test, and imposing a harsh regime of sanctions on the regime. After a second test on May 25, 2009, they unanimously passed resolution 1874, which tightened the sanctions regime significantly and established a “Panel of Experts” to “gather, examine and analyze information…regarding the implementation of the measures imposed”, for an initial period of one year. As more and more sanctions resolutions were passed in response to further nuclear and ICBM tests, the mandate for this Panel of Experts was unanimously extended each year until last week.
Leading up to the vote, China and Russia had proposed a compromise to extend the mandate of the Panel of Experts for one year, conditional on adding a sunset clause to the sanctions regime, as the Chinese delegate said “Sanctions should not be set in stone or be indefinite”. The Russian delegate argued that the situation in Korea had changed enormously since 2006 and that continuing the sanctions in the name of preventing the DPRK from becoming a nuclear power was “losing its relevance” and was “detached from reality”.
It is rather ironic that the United States and its allies have been criticizing the Russian veto of an otherwise unanimous Security Council resolution as destabilizing, given that the US routinely uses its veto power, as most followers of this site are well aware. This Russian application of its veto power has been described as a crisis for the “broader functioning of the UN Security Council and the post World War II international order”, even though it is completely obvious that we would have used our veto against any Russian or Chinese resolution to relax or discontinue the sanctions regime.
The sanctions imposed on the DPRK did not have the desired effect of deterring them from becoming a nuclear power. It is fair to ask why they failed to achieve the desired outcome, and whether continuing sanctions are likely to alter that reality. When I accompanied retired NBA superstar Dennis Rodman to North Korea, Kim Jong Un personally explained his logic to us. He remarked that Libyan leader Moammar Qaddafi had given up his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in 2003, in exchange for sanctions relief and security guarantees that weren’t worth the paper they were written on. As soon as the opportunity presented itself, in Spring 2011, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joyfully bragged that we had killed Qaddafi.
Furthermore, Saddam Hussein had allowed weapons inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency into his country, and they failed to find evidence of WMD programs (as there were none), and yet despite this, the US launched a war of regime change in 2003, which subsequently led to the death of Saddam Hussein. He concluded his argument by pointing out the fact that although Pakistan harbored America’s number one enemy, Osama bin Laden, the US never attempted a war of regime change there. In his mind the main difference was obvious – Pakistan was a nuclear power.
Given that the United States government has never been subtle about its desire for regime change in North Korea, and has refused to take the first use of nuclear weapons by the United States off the table in the event of war with the DPRK, Kim Jong's rationale is quite compelling. I certainly had no counterargument.
One must remember that the number one goal for the North Korean regime is its survival, and Kim Jong Un’s strategic decisions (like those of any other political leader) should be evaluated in that context – obviously, his priority is to stay alive and keep his job! With that in mind, the continued pursuit of a nuclear deterrent seems like the most rational option. Of course, he wants a better life for his people, and relief from economic sanctions, but not at the cost of risking the regime’s collapse.
It is important to clarify that long before the DPRK developed its nuclear program, the US had already nuclearized the peninsula. Although Paragraph 13 (d) of the Korean War Armistice Agreement forbade the introduction of any new weapons into Korea, in 1958, the Eisenhower administration deployed nuclear weapons to South Korea, in clear violation of this agreement.
This was not an isolated incident either, as the US has a long history of breaking negotiated deals with rival nations. In 1994, Bill Clinton negotiated the “Agreed Framework” in which the DPRK would shut down their graphite-moderated nuclear reactors, to be replaced with light water reactors (LWRs) to be provided by the US, with supplies of heavy oil being provided to them to provide energy in the interim. George W. Bush then slow-walked providing the LWRs and stopped the shipments of fuel oil, leading the DPRK to restart the reactors to supply energy to their people.
Bush then made the aforementioned WMD deal with Qaddafi, which the Obama administration failed to honor. Obama then negotiated the JCPOA deal with Iran, which Trump backed out of. Trump then opened dialogue with the DPRK, but the Biden administration quickly returned to “strategic patience” (i.e. giving them the silent treatment).
No wonder they feel the need for a nuclear deterrent when our policy changes so dramatically every four years, making any negotiations effectively pointless.
As Kim Jong Un told us, the DPRK policy is always consistent, but the US changes all the time, adding that if they don’t like what is happening, they just wait four years. After we brought a team of NBA players to Pyongyang in 2014, he further remarked that in doing so, we were the first Americans who ever kept their word.
No wonder they don’t trust any security guarantees the US has offered them.
Sanctions have been referred to as war by other means (with apologies to Clausewitz), and the US now has sanctions in place against more than 20 countries across Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The most comprehensive sanctions are currently imposed against Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela, with sanctions against China growing at an alarming rate. At the same time, the Chinese Yuan is being used increasingly for international trade instead of the US dollar as a result of sanctions prohibiting many countries from using the US financial system.
The height of the sanctions absurdity was best illustrated when the DPRK was alleged to have sold ammunition to Russia in early 2024. In response to this allegation, the US complained to Russia that they were violating sanctions against the DPRK, and the US complained to the DPRK that they were violating sanctions against Russia. Does the United States expect other countries to just starve to death under sanctions regimes because we said so?
Is it perhaps more rational to imagine that our overuse of economic sanctions will inevitably create trading blocs and alliances among the countries subjected to them? Iran, Russia, China, and the DPRK have plenty of reasons to dislike one another. China and Russia have had a complex hostile relationship for centuries, with Chairman Mao seeking a better relationship with the US partially because he feared a Soviet invasion. Both China and Russia repeatedly voted in favor of all the sanctions imposed on the DPRK since 2006, because they did not want a nuclear North Korea in their backyard. Iran and Russia have a long history of tensions, as do Iran and China. Iran and DPRK have only worked together in a partnership of convenience for the last 35 years because of their shared status as pariahs in the eyes of the USA.
Despite the historical tensions between Iran, Russia, China, and DPRK, the sanctions regime has forced these countries into an alliance and trading bloc of convenience, and the US has nobody to blame but themselves. It should surprise nobody that China and Russia want to get the UN out of the DPRK sanctions business. That Russia finally vetoed the continuing mandate for the Panel of Experts should come as no surprise – the only surprise is that it took them 18 years to get there.
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- Apr 7, 2024 8:40pm Apr 7, 2024 8:40pm
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
- Post #12,709
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- Edited 8:15am Apr 8, 2024 7:51am | Edited 8:15am
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What's So Great About The Great Reset, Great Taking, Great Replacement, Great Deflation, & Next Great Depression?
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BY TYLER DURDEN
SUNDAY, APR 07, 2024 - 11:20 PM
Authored by Jim Quinn via The Burning Platform blog,
“At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move all the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theatre.”
– Frank Zappa
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=pe9R4lhh
“In the past few years, you have been living within an escalating hybrid war. Globally, we have witnessed overt media control and propaganda campaigns; censorship, including arrests of people speaking in public; monitoring of all electronic communications and physical contact tracing; brutally enforced lock-down and masking requirements, with people being beaten, handcuffed, and arrested, even in their homes; suspension of healthcare services and weakening of healthcare systems; invasive testing requirements for employment and travel; forced quarantine of travelers; and coerced quarantine and “vaccination” of the healthy, general population.
Governments dropped all pretense of democracy and were emboldened to open despotism. There were no functioning checks on this power. The courts provided no effective recourse to the public. Governments broadly abused fundamental human rights using as justification prevention of the spread of infectious diseases, which are, in truth, a great many, ever-present, and continually evolving. And so, this justification, if allowed to stand, assures the end of democracy and installation of openly despotic government.”
– David Webb – The Great Taking
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=aVznYnbA
After being fortunate enough to participate in a two-hour Zoom call with David Rogers Webb, author of The Great Taking, I was intrigued enough to download his free book and read it over two days. I found David to be a humble, intelligent, thoughtful man who is deeply concerned about the future of mankind, leading him to write a book, putting him and his family at great personal risk. Using his decades of experience in the financial world and undertaking painstaking research regarding the systematic long-term rewriting of codes, laws, and regulations by those who constitute Bernays’ invisible government (aka Deep State), Webb makes a strong case for the Ruling Elite/Deep State/Shadowy billionaires in smoke-filled rooms have set the groundwork to crash the global financial system and abscond with all that remains of our accumulated wealth. I could feel his angst and anxiety about the future as he explained the details of their plan. After reading the book, I found myself agitated, angry, and feeling helpless.
You can’t help but be depressed that everything you’ve worked for over the last forty years could be “legally” stolen by those controlling the levers of our financial system in an instant. My first reaction was, how can they do this and expect to succeed? Wouldn’t the citizens across the world react violently and start hanging the culprits? And then I remembered how the masses reacted to being locked down, masked, forced to not earn a living, censored for questioning the government, arrested for swimming alone in the ocean, imprisoned for protesting a rigged election and being coerced and threatened into getting jabbed with a toxic gene altering concoction which neither protected you from contracting, spreading or dying from the annual flu (sold and marketed as the greatest deadly pandemic in history).
The covid scandemic was nothing but a dry run to see how far they could push their agenda, using authoritarian measures and the full power of the surveillance state and regime media, to scare the masses into compliance. It worked like a charm, with the vast majority of the global population proving to be nothing more than scared-compliant sheep. The ruling elite are feeling their oats and no longer feel bound to follow any laws, constitutions, or moral code.
They have shifted from relying on Huxley’s dystopian vision of a populace enslaved by pleasure, drugs, and technological distractions to Orwell’s surveillance, fear, and boot on the face dystopia, where the masses will do as they are told, or else. The caressing is over, and the crushing has begun. When the Great Taking commences, it will be done ruthlessly, enforced by those with truncheons and automatic weapons, sold to the masses as the only way to save humanity, and enforced through the legal machinations they have surreptitiously put in place over the last two decades.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=SMSFiYht
“People should either be caressed or crushed. If you do them minor damage they will get their revenge; but if you cripple them there is nothing they can do. If you need to injure someone, do it in such a way that you do not have to fear their vengeance.”
– Niccolo Machiavelli
As David Webb lays out in painstaking detail in his book, using factual provable data and documentation, as opposed to the false narratives and propaganda spewed by those who have hatched this decades-long diabolical plot to abscond with all of your hard-earned wealth, the ruling oligarchy have designed a financial system which will self-destruct when they choose to pull that lever. It has been premeditated and solidified in legal code that their scheme, through central banks and their co-conspirator financial institutions, will sweep all of your collateral (aka your financial wealth) into their grubby little hands, to save “the system”.
We will be left destitute, desperate, and indebted. With no means to service your debt, they will “legally” take the assets associated with that debt. Any rational thinking person who has been watching its government add $1 trillion to the national debt every 100 days, driving our annual interest on that debt to $1.6 trillion by the end of 2024, encouraging and aiding millions of third-world diseased mutts to stream across our borders and be shipped to cities across the country, and purposely creating massive inflation while sabotaging our energy, food, and transportation systems, has to be asking what possible purpose could there be for these insane policies and actions. It only makes sense if they plan to crash the global financial system on purpose.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=t7uymsDE
David Webb is convinced that is the plan:
“Inevitably following the “Everything Bubble” will be the “Everything Crash.” Once prices of essentially everything crash and all financial firms rapidly become insolvent, these collateral management systems will automatically sweep all collateral to the Central Clearing Counter-parties (CCPs) and Central Banks. The trap, into which all nations have been herded, is ready and waiting to be sprung. There will be an epic endpoint to the decades of seemingly out-of-control financialization, which served no beneficial purpose for humanity, but the devastating effects of which are apparent even now. It has been a deliberate strategy executed over decades. This was the purpose of inflating the global bubble entirely out of proportion with any real-world thing or activity, which must end in disaster for so many, with no pockets of resilience allowed to remain in any country.”
– David Webb – The Great Taking
Your cognitive dissonance and normalcy bias tell you they could not and would not initiate such an evil plot. I know I don’t want to believe this could or will happen because as a working professional for the last 38 years I’ve followed the rules and believed if I saved for my retirement, lived beneath my means, and invested my savings carefully, I would be rewarded with a relatively comfortable retirement. It is extremely difficult for me to comprehend how these psychopaths in suits, pulling the levers of this world, could hatch such a malevolent conspiracy, designed to cause so much misery and pain to so many.
But then I realize what they have done since 2019 with their totalitarian lockdowns, death jabs, surveillance mechanisms, imprisonment of dissenters, stealing of elections, destruction of societal norms, perpetuation of an invasion on our southern border, and provocation of global conflict designed to start World War 3. And yes, I do believe these traitorous billionaire scum would do this. David Webb shows how they did it before in 1933.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=3Hlen9ID
FDR shut down all banks in the United States on March 6, 1933. Then Congress passed the Emergency Banking Act of 1933 on March 9. According to William L. Silber, who was an economic advisor to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the Fed miraculously and suddenly in March of 1933 had the means “to supply unlimited amounts of currency to reopened banks”, which were, of course, only the banks selected by the Federal Reserve System.
The key point is the Fed chose which connected banks would survive and which banks would be permanently put out of business, resulting in millions losing their life savings. The Fed had the resources to keep thousands of banks open and avoid the pain and suffering of millions of Americans, but they purposely inflicted pain upon millions. Why? David Webb contends the Fed created the panic, provided a solution that benefited them and their crony banks, destroyed the lives of millions, and took their assets (homes, cars, farms, appliances) on a grand scale. This was done to inflict pain, vanquish the masses, and foster a facade of power, which is as true today as it was then. Webb asks the relevant questions and provides the answers:
“Did “the bankers” need to take this property? What was the real purpose? Can you get past the idea that they were trying to help? Ask yourself: if they don’t want your money, and they don’t want or need your stuff, and they’re not trying to help you, what do they want? What’s the point of all of their efforts? This may be difficult to hear: It was a deliberate strategy. It was about ultimate, complete power, allowing no centers of resistance. And so, it was about deprivation. It was about subjugation—and it still is, in more ways than we know. It was not about helping people then, and it’s not about helping people now. It is all part of the same deliberate herding of humanity and elimination of any pockets of resilience, which plagues us still.”
– David Webb – The Great Taking
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=pHCE727x
The Federal Reserve is owned by the Too Big To Trust Wall Street Behemoth Banks and does the bidding of the Deep State. The Fed is indemnified by the government (aka you and me) for any losses they incur, as they are currently sitting on $1 trillion of unrealized losses. They were a shadowy privileged institution in 1933 and have only become more powerful, shadowy, and corrupt today. They set the precedent of taking bank deposits from average Americans in the 1930s and will do it again without the slightest hesitation.
They have rigged the regulatory system in a way that makes anyone holding cash in banks an unsecured creditor with no enforceable claim to their cash when they decide to crash the system. They won’t bail out the banks the way they did in 2008/2009. Too messy and time-consuming. They will conduct a bail-in by “shifting” all your deposits from what you thought was your safe bank account to the accounts of a “protected class” created through legal machinations by our Deep State rulers. They did a test run in Cyprus in 2013. This is what is coming.
Since 2008 the Mega-Banks and Mega-Corps, with the patronage of the Fed, have achieved tremendous success in their endeavors to enrich themselves while driving small businesses and small banks into bankruptcy, and impoverishing the masses they feign to embrace. Everything they do is built upon a foundation of lies, misinformation, disinformation, and propagandized narratives spun by their regime media co-conspirators.
Today’s “Everything Bubble” was created by the Fed, using the justification of “saving the world” during the Great Financial Crisis of 2008/2009 and “saving the world” again from the Great Flu Virus of 2020/2022 by lowering interest rates to zero for the most of 15 years. The major Wall Street banks were all effectively bankrupt in the Fall of 2008 and should have been liquidated using our existing bankruptcy laws. Stockholders and bondholders would have been wiped out, while depositors would have been made whole. Their assets would have been sold off to smaller banks who did not take world-destroying risks and leverage themselves 30 to 1.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=rYijFL1R
Everything that has happened since 2008 has been nothing more than a vast pillaging operation disguised as saving humanity from a never-ending series of crises created by the very psychopaths who purposely created the crises in the first place. So why would it be so inconceivable to think they would initiate their final takedown of the financial system, siphoning the remaining wealth of the masses?
How else can we explain the seemingly insane measures undertaken by the captured and controlled politician puppets, along with the central bankers (owned by Wall Street), and sold to the masses as normal by their regime media mouthpieces? They have secretively put all the pieces in place from a legal and regulatory standpoint to drain the remaining wealth from the financial accounts of tens of millions when they initiate the next planned and executed financial “crisis”.
Amidst the global chaos, as a wave of insolvencies sweeps across the developed world, bloodshed from the ensuing global and civil wars scars the earth, wailing and gnashing of teeth by the victims reach a crescendo, the Fed and their owners will not only survive but thrive. We’ve seen this show before. During COVID, we needed to follow their orders so we wouldn’t die or kill our neighbors. It was all a lie. This time, with your money, investments, and assets purchased with debt in the hands of the few connected financial institutions, the fear will be putting food on the table, obtaining healthcare, and trying to survive.
Those in control will use their regime's media propaganda outlets to paint the narrative, everything they have done is to ensure the survival of our system. They will act like noble caretakers of humanity, doing whatever it takes for mankind, while initiating the entire financial system demolition in the first place. They are counting on the ignorant masses to remain ignorant, fearful, and terrorized, willing to do whatever they are told to survive. According to David Webb, the CBDCs will be their solution. It’s all about power and control, just as it has always been.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=VUqQwvoH
“The focus of the Atlantic Council is military strategy, not economics. And what is the Atlantic Council focusing on now? Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), which is virtual money backed and issued directly by central banks. All G7 economies have now moved into the development stage of CBDC, and 18 of the G20 countries are now in the advanced stage of development. Why is this happening now globally? Is it a desire to bring “financial inclusion” to the disadvantaged? Why would The Atlantic Council, a military strategy think tank, focus on CBDC? We are living within a global hybrid war, a component of which will be the collapse of the banking, money, and payment systems globally. War aims will be achieved by means other than kinetic war. The foremost aim of the people who have privately controlled the central banks and money creation is that they will remain in power, forever. They can risk no pockets of resistance.”
– David Webb – The Great Reset
They have been setting up the infrastructure for CBDCs, just as they rigged the financial system to abscond with your wealth, for over a decade, as they plan to force you into their new totalitarian electronic gulag. When they are confident their CBDC scheme is ready to launch, they will push the demolition button on the debt-saturated house of cards, known as our financial system. When you wrap your head around their evil blueprint to enslave the world, you can make sense of what you see happening with your own eyes. What is happening is not normal. It makes no sense to any normal critical-thinking person, but the majority of the population are addicted to their phones and believe whatever they are told by their government, regime media, TikTok influencers, and Facebook friends.
How could our “elected” leaders be adding $1 trillion to the national debt every 100 days, while jacking the interest on that debt to $1.6 trillion per year, unless they want to crash the financial system? How could our “president” (his handlers) encourage, sponsor, and facilitate the invasion of our country by millions of 3rd world, tuberculosis-ridden, mutts, drug dealers, child traffickers, and terrorists, unless they want to collapse our cities and social welfare system?
How could our government medical agencies promote the poisoning of the masses with a gene-altering Big Pharma jab, the mutilation of children because they were brainwashed by mentally ill left-wing teachers who told them they can be whatever sex they choose, drugging young boys who act like boys to make them like girls, and doling out anti-depressants like candy to middle-aged unhappy cat ladies who bought the entire feminism narrative hook, line and sinker, unless they wanted to create a nation of physically and mentally damaged, easily manipulated drones?
In addition, they are attempting to destroy our energy infrastructure, our farmers, and small businesses, while attempting to ignite a civil war within our borders and a global war with Ukraine and the Middle East, to further spur a global collapse. First collapse, then controls through CBDCs.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=dkgu7GDR
“The key difference with the CBDC is the central bank will have absolute control over the rules and regulations that will determine the use of that expression of central bank liability, and also, we will have the technology to enforce that. In other words: CBDC means absolute control and so, if the “old” money system somehow collapses, new money will be provided by the central banks in the form of Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), the new and improved control system. Imagine . . . it is chaos. You have lost everything but your smartphone (If you don’t have one, don’t worry—you will be issued one.) You will download an app. You will click boxes agreeing to everything. You will become increasingly indebted with each payment you make using the CBDC you are “given” on your phone. You will be told what to do and what not to do from then on. You will comply if you want to eat.”
– David Webb – The Great Reset
Deprivation and subjugation are their goals and being they are evil psychopaths; they have no empathy for you or your plight. They have moved into the Orwellian stage of power for its own sake and a boot stomping on your face forever. Webb contends the “Great Reset” is anti-human and will introduce a modern-day techno-feudalistic system, built upon a foundation of fear, scarcity, surveillance, and threats of violence for non-compliance.
A caste system more extreme than currently exists will separate the lords of the manor from the enslaved serfs. The first Great Depression was caused by the Fed, benefited the favored Wall Street banks, created a decade of deflation, bankrupted businesses, and destroyed the lives of the poorest. This Greater Depression will be far worse, as the immense consumer credit and mortgage credit bubbles will result in tens of millions losing their homes, automobiles, and various electronic gadgets bought on credit. Those who forget the past are condemned to relive it.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=JCF3wc0Z
“When the “Everything Bubble” is imploded, we will face a deflationary depression, which will span many years, even decades. This coming Great Deflation is intrinsic to the Great Taking. The Architects of the Great Taking have planned and prepared to use this dynamic fully, secure in their knowledge that, as night follows day, massive and prolonged deflation will certainly follow the epic debt expansion super cycle, that they created. The Architects have assured that they alone are positioned to take everything and that you and your children are positioned on the other side of that, i.e., to lose everything, to be enslaved and even destroyed by it. People will be knocked down, and not be able to get up again. That is intentional, as the populace has been systematically encouraged to go deeply into debt.
Whom the gods would destroy, they first cause to borrow at low rates of interest! As in the Great Depression, prolonged deflation will ensure that people who are in debt will not be able to make payments on their debts, let alone repay them. They will be trapped. All property and businesses financed with debt will be taken. With profound and persistent deflation assured to stretch over many years, debt becomes a powerful weapon of conquest. Debt is not a real thing. It is an invention, a construct designed to take real things.”
– David Webb – The Great Reset
Ever since reading Webb’s book my mind has been unsettled, trying to grasp how this could happen, while trying to convince myself it won’t. We’ve muddled along for years and all predictions of collapse due to unsustainable debt growth have failed to materialize. My mind tells me Webb is right, while my heart hopes he’s wrong. But I know hope is not an option. No one in my financial position, or likely 99.9% of the population, will be able to avoid this accelerating train coming down the track.
Every non-insider on the planet will be negatively impacted by the Great Taking. The best we can do is prepare and prep based on our resources, location, family situation, abilities, and attitude. Eliminating debt, having cash-on-hand, having precious metals on hand, being heavily armed, creating a local network of like-minded people, having no cash or investments in Wall Street banks, and even owning Bitcoin in your private wallet, could help alleviate some of the pain from the “Great Taking”.
Webb recognizes we are already in a hybrid war against these psychopathic billionaire totalitarians bent on implementing their Great Reset, simultaneously with their Great Taking. It is a multi-front war waged on the financial battlefield, demographic battlefield, cultural battlefield, and technological battlefield, and ultimately will need to be settled on traditional battlefields across the globe. The level of malevolence required to perpetrate these heinous crimes against humanity is incomprehensible to the average person, therefore the masses don’t believe anyone would commit such acts. Webb knows these people exist and are capable of the vilest atrocities.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=00bQ4-ch
“Wars have always been not so much about taking things as about subjugation of populations on all sides. Vast destruction and death are acceptable to their planners. You might ask, how could the people plotting and executing such insane schemes be held together? I suggest that it has something to do with the binding power of shared guilt, of the criminal pact. The perpetrators are each and all bound, whether explicitly or unconsciously, by evidence of shameful, treasonous acts committed against their own people. The commission of crime is a power totem among them. The more heinous the crime, the more powerful is the binding force.”
– David Webb – The Great Taking
Based on my observations during the Zoom call with David Webb, he struck me as a mild-mannered guy who is nervous about the future of the world and can identify the culprits, based on their actions. Despite understanding their level of psychotic behavior and disregard for the future of humanity, he seems to think they can be defeated through non-violent means. I think that is a false hope, as you can only defeat power through superior power on a physical, intellectual, and spiritual level.
I do believe they are losing control, resulting in an acceleration of their plans, ramping up of violence, blatant disregard for laws or the Constitution, and mistakes and missteps on their part. Based on their need for an accelerated collapse, I have a hard time believing we make it to the November elections without a triggering event initiating the dominoes toppling, and all hell breaking loose financially, militarily, and on a societal basis. Their deceptions are being revealed and an increasing number of citizens are angry and unwilling to comply.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=WaqI5xn3
The “Great Taking” is a well-thought-out plan, but it is still just a plan. It can be thwarted and resisted if enough people awaken from their normal stupor. The odds are not in our favor, as the masses remain ignorant of what is coming, but the more people who can be awakened, the better our chances. We know the Deep State billionaire brain trust behind these schemes is heavily guarded and protected from us, commoners. But these aren’t the heavily compensated apparatchik front men doing the day-to-day dirty work. These vile cogs in this machinery of destruction have names, addresses, and families. Fear works both ways. The good guys also have tech-savvy individuals capable of throwing electronic monkey wrenches into the gears of the Deep State machinery.
https://assets.zerohedge.com/s3fs-pu...?itok=LAJmqpUj
This entire episode is playing out during the second half of this Fourth Turning, where chaos and bloodshed reach a crescendo, as we approach the climax. The battle between good and evil couldn’t be any starker. Everyone will be forced to choose a side. I’ve spent the last sixteen years of my life trying to convince as many people as possible this nation has been on a burning platform of unsustainable choices. Instead of trying to extinguish the flames, our so-called leaders have sprayed gasoline onto the burning platform.
We are closer than ever to seeing that platform collapse and sink to the bottom of the sea. The Great Reset and Great Taking schemes must be prevented from happening at all costs. Our moment of truth approaches. We need to meet the challenges ahead with no fear and no doubts. It’s time to channel our inner Josey Wales if we want to win. Good luck and Godspeed.
- Post #12,710
- Quote
- Edited 8:33am Apr 10, 2024 8:08am | Edited 8:33am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
ACCOUNT 00463129 - OPENED - March 15, 2024 at 8:10 AM
16 Forex trades are done and closed. No Loss in any of the 16 Forex trades.
One open position now of SHORT 100 units of Dow Jones 30 - CPI Number comes out at 8:30 AM - IT will move markets whatever the number - Probably HIGH CPI
Locked in Net Profits in the 16 Forex trades is $4,395.31 US dollars.
- Post #12,711
- Quote
- Apr 10, 2024 8:32am Apr 10, 2024 8:32am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
ACCOUNT 00463129 - OPENED - March 15, 2024 at 8:10 AM
16 Forex trades are done and closed. No Loss in any of the 16 Forex trades.
One open position now of SHORT 100 units of Dow Jones 30 - CPI Number comes out at 8:30 AM - IT will move markets whatever the number - Probably HIGH CPI
Locked in Net Profits in the 16 Forex trades is $4,395.31 US dollars.
Bruce - I was CORRECT - HIGH CPI NUMBER - NO CUTS THIS YEAR - PROFIT on open Forex Trade now closed is $889.10 US dollars.
New Balance - ALL IN CASH, Mark and Ron.... $55,719.91 US dollars - PLUS 10% in less than 30 days of Forex trading - Total Forex trades is 17.
My work is done for today.
- Post #12,712
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- Apr 12, 2024 8:59am Apr 12, 2024 8:59am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
I am ready to do what needs to be done.
Benjamin Israel Margolese
- Post #12,713
- Quote
- Edited 10:02am Apr 14, 2024 9:40am | Edited 10:02am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
Why Is Gold Rising Now, Where Is It Headed Tomorrow?
https://staging.goldswitzerland.com/...47-1-Matt.webp
By Matthew Piepenburg
Partner
April 14, 2024
Needless to say, we at VON GREYERZ spend a good deal of time thinking about, well… gold.
The Complex, the Simple, the Math and the History
Year after year, and week after week, there is always a new way to examine gold price moves and decipher the obvious and not-so obvious forces which flow behind, ahead, above and below its monetary and, yes, metallic, move through time.
Today, deep into the early decades of the 21st century, and well over 100 years since the not-so immaculate conception of the Fed in the early 20th century, we could (and have) spent pages and paragraphs on key turning points in the rigged to fail history of paper vs. metallic money.
At times, this effort can and has seemed intense and even complex, with all kinds of historical facts, mathematical comparisons and “big events.”
The turning points of gold’s relationship with fiat currencies, and its role in preserving wealth, for example, are known to an admitted minority—as only about 0.5% of global financial allocations include physical gold.
Gold’s Language
Yet the need, role and direction of gold is fairly blunt, at least for those with eyes to see and ears to hear.
History, for example, has some clear things to say about paper money.
And so does gold.
From the Bretton Woods promises of 1944 and Nixon’s open and subsequent welch on the same in 1971 to the 2001 outsourcing of the American dream to China under Clinton (and the WTO) or the recent weaponization of USD in Q1 of 2022, gold has been watching, acting and speaking to those who understand her language.
The Big Question: Why Is Gold Rising Now?
And this year, with gold reaching all-time-highs, piercing resistance lines and racing toward what the Wall Street fancy lads call “price discovery,” we are understandably getting a lot of interview requests, phone calls and even emails from friends otherwise silent for years and now suddenly asking the same thing:
“Why is gold rising now?”
The Wall Street side of my odd brain, like it or not, gets all excited by such questions.
Never at a loss for words, my pen and mouth rapidly seek to wax poetic on the many answers to why gold matters forever in general, and why it is rising in particular now.
Toward that end, the list of the fancy and not-so-fancy answers to this question in recent years, articles, and interviews could look as simple (or as complex) as the following list of 7 key factors:
The Malignant Seven
- Every debt crisis leads to a currency crisis—hence: Good for gold.
- All paper currencies, as Voltaire quipped, eventually revert to their paper value of zero, and all debt-soaked nations, as von Mises, David Hume and even Ernest Hemingway warned, debase their currencies to retain power—hence: Good for gold.
- Rising rates (and fiscal dominance) used to “fight inflation” are too expensive for even Uncle Sam’s wallet, thus he, like all debt-soaked nations, will debase his currency to pay his own IOUs—hence: Good for gold.
- Global central banks are dumping unloved and untrusted USTs and stacking gold at undeniably important levels—hence: Good for gold.
- After generations of importing US inflation and being the dog wagged by the tail of the USD, the BRICS+ nations, prompted by a weaponized Greenback, are now turning their tails slowly but surely away from the USD dog—hence: Good for gold.
- The Gulf Cooperation Council oil powers, once seduced (circa 1973) into a Petrodollar arrangement by a high-yielding UST and globally revered USD, are now openly selling oil outside of the 2024 version of that far less-yielding UST and far less-trusted USD—hence: Good for gold.
- That legalized price-fixing sham otherwise known as the COMEX employed in 1974 to keep a permanent boot to the neck of the gold price, is running out of the physical gold needed to, well…price fix gold—hence: Good for gold.
In short, each of these themes–from sovereign (and unprecedented) debt levels, historical debt lessons, the secrets of the rate markets, global central banks dumping USTs, or the implications of changing oil markets to the OTC derivatives scam masquerading as capitalism–all DO explain why gold is rising now.
This list, of course, may be simple, but the forces, indicators, lingo, math, and trends within each theme can be admittedly complex, as each theme is worthy of its textbook rather than a bullet point.
Indeed, currencies, markets, history, bonds, geopolitics, energy moves, and derivative desks are complicated little creatures.
But despite all this complexity, study, and deliberation, if you want to address the question of “why is gold rising now?”—the answer is almost too simple for those of us who wish to appear, well… “complex.”
The Too-Simple Answer to the Big Question
In other words, the simple answer—the answer that cuts through all the fog, lingo, and math of “sophisticated” financial markets–boils down to this:
GOLD IS NOT RISING AT ALL. THE USD IS JUST GETTING WEAKER AND WEAKER.
At VON GREYERZ, we never measure gold’s value in dollars, yen, euros, or any other fiat currency. We measure gold in ounces and grams.
Why?
Because history and math (as well as all the current and insane financial, geopolitical, and social events staring us straight in the eyes today) teach us not to trust a currency backed by man (or the “full faith in trust” of the UST or a Fed’s mouse-clicked currency), but instead to seek value in monetary metals created by nature.
Fake Money & Empty Promises
Once a currency loses a gold backing (a nod to Nixon), it is nothing more than the empty promise of a government now free to print and spend without a chaperone to buy votes, market bubbles and even a Nobel Prize (i.e., what Hemingway called “temporary prosperity”) but then hand the bill and inflation to future generations (what Hemingway then called “permanent ruin”).
Gold Does Nothing
So yes, gold, as Buffet and others have quipped, “does nothing.” It just sits there and stares and you.
But while this yield-less pet rock sits there “doing nothing,” the currency by which you measure your wealth is in fact quite busy melting like an ice cube–one day, month, and year at a time.
https://vongreyerz.gold/content/uplo...4/image-13.png
Here’s to Doing Nothing: Price vs. Value
Sometimes a picture can say a thousand words and make the most complex economic topics or themes, like “price vs. value” or “store of value,” make immediate sense.
Think, for example, about a 1-ounce bar of gold just doing nothing in say… 1920.
Well, if you had 250 of those do-nothing ounces in a shoe box in 1920, which was “priced” then at around USD 20 per ounce, you could afford the average US home, then priced at $5000.
Today, however, the average price of a US home is $500,000.
So, if your grandfather left you a shoebox with 5000 crumpled Dollars inside, it would not even pay for the landscaping needed for that same house today.
But if your grandfather had instead handed you a shoebox with those same 250 singe-ounce bars of gold (today “priced” at 2300/ounce), you could buy the same average home and the landscaper too—with a nice tip for the latter.
So, do you still think those little gold bars just stared back at you, doing nothing?
After all, the shoe box with the 5000 USD inside was very busy doing one thing very well, namely: Losing its value like snow melting off a spring mountainside…
https://vongreyerz.gold/content/uplo...4/image-14.png
So, which shoebox would you want to measure your wealth?
Is the one measured in fiat dollars actively losing value? Or the one measured in gold ounces “doing nothing” but retaining its value?
Sometimes the complex is that simple.
https://vongreyerz.gold/content/uplo...4/image-15.png
The Next Big Question: Where’s Gold Headed Tomorrow?
The pathway to answering such a question is just as clear as the one we just traveled.
The aforementioned “Malignant Seven” are each factors which we believe will continue to push the USD down and hence gold higher, because, and to repeat: It’s not that gold will get stronger, it’s just that all fiat currencies in general, and the weaponized, distrusted and over-indebted USD in particular, get weaker.
But for those still understandably and realistically convinced that despite its myriad and almost endless flaws, the US (and its Dollar) is still, for now at least, the best horse in the glue factory, a case can be made that measured relative to other currencies (i.e., the DXY), that the USD is supreme, and that when and as financial markets weaken, investors will flock to it like a lifeboat in a tempest.
Milkshake Theory?
Such a credible view is held by very smart folks like Brent Johnson, with whom I have discussed the USD at length.
Brent’s “milkshake theory” intelligently argues that powerful demand forces from the euro dollar, SWIFT, and derivative markets, for example, create a massive, “straw-like” sucking sound for the “milky” USD, which demand will keep it strong, and send it stronger, in the seasons ahead.
He may be right.
But I think differently.
Why?
Two primary reasons stick out.
No “Straw” for the UST
First, despite the undeniably powerful demand forces at play for the USD, demand for USTs is, and has been, tanking around the world since 2014. That is, foreigners don’t trust the US IOUs as much as they did before America became a debt trap.
https://vongreyerz.gold/content/uplo...4/image-16.png
Ever since foreign (central bank) interest in USTs began net-selling in 2014, and gold interest began net-buying in 2010, the only buyer of last resort for US public debt has been the US Fed, and the only tool the US Fed has to purchase that debt is a mouse-clicker (“money printer”) at the Eccles Building.
Unfortunately, creating money out of thin air is not a sustainable policy but a near-term fantasy. More importantly, such a policy is inherently, and by definition: Inflationary.
My US Realpolitik Theory…
The second, and perhaps more important reason the USD’s declining future is fairly easy to see (or argue), is this:
EVEN UNCLE SAM WANTS AND NEEDS A WEAKER DOLLAR.
Why?
Because the only way out of the biggest debt hole the US has ever seen is to inflate its way out of it by debasing the currency to “save” an otherwise rotten system.
We’ve argued this for years, and the facts supporting this historically repeated pattern (and view) haven’t changed; they’ve just grown worse.
That is why it was easy to foresee that inflation would not be “transitory” despite all the useless commentary (and Fed-speak) arguing to the contrary.
That is also why it was easy to see that Powell’s “war on inflation” was a political ruse—an optics play.
Powell’s real aim was (and remains) inflationary via negative real rates (i.e., inflation higher than 10Y bond yields).
Thus, even while pursuing his “higher-for-longer” and anti-inflationary rate hikes, actual inflation, which Powell needed, was still ripping.
But he (and the BLS) was able to get around this embarrassing CPI reality by simply lying about the actual inflation…
In other words: Classic DC fork-tonguing…
China is Not Turning Japanese
But in case you still need further proof that the US wants and needs a weaker USD to fake its way out of its self-created debt disaster via an increasingly diluted USD at YOUR expense, just consider what’s happening with China.
Unbeknownst to many, Yellen has been scurrying off to Asia to convince, cajole or even threaten China into accepting a weaker USD vs the CNY.
Why?
Because the prior, “stronger” 40-year version of the Dollar has rendered expensive US exports (and trade deficits) unable to compete with cheaper Chinese goods.
This floating currency game was a trick the US played on Japan when I was a kid—i.e., weaken the USD to fight the then-rising Sun of Japan’s then-rising power.
But China ain’t Japan. It won’t float its currency in dollar terms.
So, what then can the US do to weaken the USD without upsetting China?
Does DC Finally Want Higher Gold Prices?
Well, as Luke Gromen once again makes beautifully clear, the easiest path forward for all parties concerned is to simply (and finally) let gold go much, much higher.
The surest and steadiest path to a weaker USD is higher gold.
Yellen’s Treasury Department could use its Exchange Stabilization Fund to buy/sell gold and other financial securities to control the USD without having to rely so much on the Fed’s now embarrassing money printer.
Gold is now a critical pivot point and tool for the US. If gold went, for example, to $4000 while CNY gold sits at 16,000, China’s central bank would have to re-rate higher in Dollar terms, pushing the CNY higher.
But such an arrangement won’t upset China, as it holds a lot more gold than the World Gold Council reports.
Rather than float the CNY in Dollar terms, China could instead float its CNY in GOLD terms.
In short: A veritable win-win for China and the US, with gold now leading the way.
Or stated otherwise, you know it’s gonna be a gold tailwind when both China and DC are seeking higher gold.
Based on the foregoing, do you still think gold does nothing?
Think harder.
About Matthew Piepenburg
Matt began his finance career as a transactional attorney before launching his first hedge fund during the NASDAQ bubble of 1999-2001 Thereafter, he began investing his own and other HNW family funds into alternative investment vehicles while operating as a General Counsel, CIO and later Managing Director of a single and multi-family office. Matthew worked closely as well with Morgan Stanley’s... More...
Matthew Piepenburg
Partner
VON GREYERZ AG
Zurich, Switzerland
Phone: +41 44 213 62 45
VON GREYERZ AG's global client base strategically stores an important part of its wealth in Switzerland in physical gold and silver outside the banking system. VON GREYERZ is pleased to deliver a unique service to our highly esteemed wealth preservation clientele in over 90 countries.
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Articles may be republished if full credits are given with a link to VONGREYERZ.GOLD
- Post #12,714
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- Edited Apr 15, 2024 8:50am Apr 14, 2024 4:29pm | Edited Apr 15, 2024 8:50am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
Alamos Gold: The Argonaut Gold Acquisition Will Boost Production And Deliver Substantial Synergies
Apr. 14, 2024 8:00 AM
Alamos Gold Inc. (AGI) Stock, AGI:CA StockAR:CA, ARNGF3 Comments2 Likes
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Bang For The Buck
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Summary
- Alamos Gold is acquiring Argonaut Gold to gain the Magino mine, increasing its annualized production volume above 600Koz of gold.
- The acquisition will provide Alamos Gold with a long reserve life, a new mill, significant synergies, and a tax pool in Canada.
- The addition of Magino will increase Alamos Gold's consolidated AISC in 2024, but Magino’s costs will be closer to the other Alamos Gold assets from 2025 and onward.
- This idea was discussed in more depth with members of my private investing community, Off The Beaten Path. Learn More »
https://static.seekingalpha.com/cdn/...o=getty-c-w750
Overview
Alamos Gold (NYSE:AGI) is a North-American mid-size gold mining company, with producing assets in Canada and Mexico. A few weeks ago, the company announced a friendly acquisition of Argonaut Gold (OTCPK:ARNGF) to get the Magino mine, located right next to Alamos Gold's Island Gold mine. Argonaut's other higher-cost mines in the U.S. and Mexico will be spun out into a new company.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...8786026235.png
Figure 1 - Source: Alamos Gold Presentation
If we assume the acquisition of Argonaut Gold goes through, Magino will be Alamos Gold's fourth producing operation, somewhat dependent on if Island Gold and Magino are counted separately or as one larger operation. They are located right next to each other, which means there are a lot of synergies in the recently announced acquisition for the company.
Magino will take Alamos Gold's annualized production volume above 600Koz of gold. The pre-tax synergies are estimated to $515M, which is about the same amount as the enterprise value of the entire transaction.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...9440273626.png
Figure 2 - Source: Alamos Gold Presentation
The addition of Magino will increase the consolidated AISC for Alamos Gold in 2024 due to the recent ramp up issues at Magino, but in the next few years, Magino's operating costs are expected to be just marginally above Alamos Gold's consolidated costs. The production volume is expected to increase by about 25% from this transaction, while the share count of Alamos Gold will only increase by 5%.
It is hard to overstate what a good deal this is for Alamos Gold, which will now receive a mine with a long reserve life, a brand-new 10,000 t/d mill, a $1B tax pool which will offset taxes for the next few years in Canada, and it will also allow the company to decommission the existing Island Gold mill and save on planned expansion capital.
On the negative side, Alamos Gold will receive about 300Koz of gold hedges over the next 3 years, from the time this transaction closes, around July this year. This will put some downside pressure on the AISC margin for the company, but given the overall cost trend for Alamos Gold and the strong gold price, the company is on track for a record AISC margin going forward, even with these gold hedges.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...1214667768.png
Figure 3 - Source: Argonaut Gold Q4-24 FS
There is always a small risk that there is a competing bid on Argonaut, but that risk has probably decreased now when the C$50M private placement that Alamos Gold provided Argonaut with, has closed. The cash will provide Argonaut with the liquidity it needs until the acquisition is finalized.
Operations
The below charts look at production and cost for Alamos Gold's three operating mines over time, which are the Young-Davidson & Island Gold mines in Ontario, Canada, and Mulatos district in Mexico. Please note that the consolidated guidance figures are prior to the addition of Magino.
The company also has the Lynn Lake development project in Manitoba, Canada, which could be in production during the second half of 2027, but the timeline has not been finalized at this point.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...1270022367.png
Figure 4 - Source: Corporate Presentations
The company is relatively diversified in terms of production between the three operating mines, they are all expected to produce between 150-200Koz of gold in 2024.
Over the last 5 years, with the pre-Magino guidance for 2024 included, the consolidated cash cost has increased by about 12%, which is impressive given the amount of inflation we have seen in the mining industry during this time. It is also worth pointing out the smoothness of the data, no mine has had a terrible year during this period, which speaks to quality management team and impressive execution.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...7949055414.png
Figure 5 - Source: Corporate Presentations
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...8133932903.png
Figure 6 - Source: Corporate Presentations
The consolidated AISC has also increased over time, but only 10% during this period, which is an impressive achievement, even if there will be a slight temporary bump for AISC during 2024 following the addition of Magino. In the chart below, we can for example see how Alamos Gold has diverged from the industry cost trend over the last couple of years.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...6045677161.png
Figure 7 - Source: Company Press Releases
This is the primary reason why Alamos Gold has performed so much better than most of its industry peers over the last 3 years. So, there should be no doubt about Alamos Gold being a quality gold mining company with a good track record.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...6272092628.png
Figure 8 - Source: Koyfin
Capital Allocation
Alamos Gold has no debt and did in the end of 2023 have $225M in cash, which will be used to settle the Argonaut debt once the transaction is finalized. The company has had some minor buybacks over the years and pays a small quarterly dividend of $0.025 per share, which equals a dividend yield of 0.7% using the latest share price.
However, much of the operating cash flow is being spent on growing and improving the assets, as seen in the chart below.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...1760291886.png
Figure 9 - Source: Alamos Gold Quarterly Reports
Reserves
Alamos did in February of this year provide a reserve update, where the company had 10.7Moz of gold reserves. We have seen very impressive reserve growth over time, and the grade has improved over time as well.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...8434152138.png
Figure 10 - Source: Company Press Release
The company will get an additional 2.4Moz of gold reserves with Magino and close to 4.6Moz of M&I resources, where I expect that reserves can quite easily grow by infill drilling the resources. Overall, there are no substantial concerns on the reserve side for Alamos Gold.
Valuation & Conclusion
The main concern with an investment with Alamos Gold is probably the valuation, at least at first glance.
https://static.seekingalpha.com/uplo...3785250714.png
Figure 11 - Source: Koyfin
The above chart shows that the forward-looking EV to EBITDA is 9.1 and the forward-looking Price to Earnings ratio is as high as 25, which are at the higher end of historical trading ranges.
We have seen the estimates increase marginally over the last few weeks following the announcement of the acquisition and the higher gold price, but I would argue the estimates have yet to price in the new reality for Alamos Gold of higher production, synergies, and an improved gold price. So, the valuation is more attractive than what the chart above might indicate.
With that said, an investment in Alamos Gold is more about a reasonably cheap high-quality gold mining company than a depressed deep value opportunity.
I also think Magino has the potential to grow production substantially over time, Argonaut simply ran out of balance sheet capacity to see that through. If Alamos Gold manages to grow production at Magino, that has the potential to take consolidated cost levels even lower, but it remains to be seen where this falls on Alamos Gold's list of growth projects.
Editor's Note: This article discusses one or more securities that do not trade on a major U.S. exchange. Please be aware of the risks associated with these stocks.
If you like this article and are interested in more frequent analysis of my holding companies, real-time notifications on portfolio changes, together with macro and industry analysis. I would encourage you to have a look at my marketplace service, Off The Beaten Path.
I primarily invest in turnarounds in natural resource industries, where I have a typical holding period of 1-3 years. Focusing on value offers good downside protection and can still provide great upside participation. My portfolio generated a return of 81% during 2020, 39% in 2021, -8% in 2022, and 12% in 2023.
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Bang For The Buck
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Bang for the Buck manages a small investment company. He primarily invests in turnaround stories and is currently focused on the precious metals, uranium, oil & natural gas, and occasionally other natural resource industries due to monetary and fiscal policies together with underinvestments and very attractive valuations.
He runs the investment group Off The Beaten Path. It focuses on companies with quality characteristics that are trading at depressed valuations, which do allow investors to participate in the upside of natural resource investing, without experiencing the more extreme drawdowns, that are otherwise so prevalent in natural resource investing. Learn more.
Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial long position in the shares of ARNGF either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
I am long Argonaut Gold and expect to keep most of my Alamos Gold shares provided the acquisition goes through.
Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.
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- Post #12,715
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- Edited 11:34am Apr 15, 2024 9:38am | Edited 11:34am
- | Commercial Member | Joined Dec 2014 | 11,569 Posts
Disliked{image} ACCOUNT 00463129 - OPENED - March 15, 2024 at 8:10 AM 16 Forex trades are done and closed. No Loss in any of the 16 Forex trades. One open position now of SHORT 100 units of Dow Jones 30 - CPI Number comes out at 8:30 AM - IT will move markets whatever the number - Probably HIGH CPI Locked in Net Profits in the 16 Forex trades is $4,395.31 US dollars. Bruce - I was CORRECT - HIGH CPI NUMBER - NO CUTS THIS YEAR - PROFIT on open Forex Trade now closed is $889.10 US dollars. New Balance - ALL IN CASH, Mark and Ron.... $55,719.91 US dollars...Ignored
My first position was shorted at 38,356.51 and the second at 38,392.25
I just closed my second position at 38,365.05 to go along with an earlier trade closed yesterday for a profit of $430 US dollars.
The position that I just closed made a net profit of $136.00 Us dollars.
UPDATE AT 9:47 AM
I did 5 total trades and all Forex positions are closed. The CASH balance is now $56,590.51 US dollars. The total profits in the 5 Forex trades is $787.30 US dollars.
I usually do 25 Forex trades each day or 500 each month of 20 Forex trading days.
So it is time to either SHIT or get off the POT with NO DISRESPECT to anyone that reads this post.
Maybe MB or RR or anyone else that I have helped or given my time and in some cases, my money so here is a summary of my Forex Trades this day.
(1) Shorted 25 units of SP500 Closed April 14, 2024 at 6:10 PM. On Sunday the Forex markets open at 6:00 PM.
PROFIT $430.00 US dollars.
(2) Shorted 50 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024, at 9:34 AM Trade opened at 9:32 AM.
PROFIT $136.00 US dollars.
(3) Shorted 25 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024, at 9:44 AM Trade opened at 9:41 AM
PROFIT $75.50
(4) Shorted 50 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024, at 9:45 AM Trade opened at 9:39 AM
PROFIT $86.00
(5) Shorted 50 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024, at 9:46 AM Trade opened at 9:29 AM
PROFIT $59.80 US dollars.
(6) Shorted 100 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024, at 10:08 AM Trade opened at 9:55 AM
PROFIT $1,152.00 US dollars.
(7) Shorted 25 units of Dow 30 Closed April 15, 2024 at 10:09 AM
PROFIT $305.50 US dollars.
The total Net Profit for today on 7 Forex Trades as just described is $2,244.80 US dollars.
WWW.AVIELFOREXLEARNINGEDGE.COM
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Financial Forecast 2025-2032: Please Don't Be Naive
April 15, 2024
Rather than attempt to evade Caesar's reach, a better strategy might be to 'go gray': blend in, appear average.
Let's start by stipulating that I don't "like" this forecast. I'm not "talking my book" (for example, promoting nuclear power because I own shares in a uranium mine) or issuing this forecast because I favor it. I simply see it as the most likely trajectory of the global financial system, based on history and the dynamics of human systems. "Liking" it or not liking it has nothing to do with it: the opinions of Titanic passengers who didn't "like" that the ship was sinking didn't affect the outcome.
You already know the global financial system is untenable. In a nutshell, the expansion of production and consumption has been funded by the expansion of credit--money borrowed from future resources and income. The rate of expanding debt far surpasses the anemic rates of expanding production, and this rapidly expanding mountain of debt is perched precariously on the phantom collateral generated by The Everything Bubble, the astounding expansion of asset prices as those with the lowest cost access to credit have bid up every asset class, from real estate to gold to bitcoin to stocks to fine art.
All these assets are phantom collateral because they were bid up on the wings of cheap, abundant credit. History is rather decisive: all credit-asset bubbles pop, and the price of the assets round-trips back to pre-bubble valuations. As the bubble pops, credit shifts from being abundant and near zero in cost to being scarce and dear.
The commercial real estate sector (CRE) is a real-time example of this dynamic. Half-empty buildings are being dumped at a fraction of their peak valuations, and then sold again for even less or abandoned to default and liquidation. This is how all bubbles pop; there is no other template supported by history. Humans cling to magical thinking and grasp at straws rather than face the unwelcome reality that the cycle has turned and there is no happy ending for those who believe the "real value" of an asset is the peak price at the top of the bubble.
Now that we understand the impossibility of keeping The Everything Bubble forever inflated, let's shift our attention to those tasked with keeping the system from collapsing. In my view, the closest analogy is police officers tasked with protecting the often ungrateful and undeserving while being plagued by do-gooders and naysayers who are safely isolated from the wretchedness they demand the cops deal with in a manner that meets with their refined approval.
In other words, we and them: only those who share the responsibility for protecting the often ungrateful and undeserving while being plagued by do-gooders and naysayers can understand. Outsiders know little of the realities and are often naive, basing their convictions on what they think "should happen" rather than the limitations of real life.
This will be the mindset of the authorities tasked with "saving" the system we all depend on--especially the wealthiest who have benefited the most. This is of course the class that feels most entitled to advocate for special treatment: we're rich and important, so you should listen to us and do what works for us.
In other words, they like the do-gooders, naysayers, and whiners telling the cops how to do their jobs. Those tasked with saving a system sliding toward an inevitable crisis will have little patience for obstructionists, however well-meaning. The attitude of those carrying the responsibility for saving the system will be: do your part, get out of the way, stop whining, and be grateful we're saving the system for your benefit.
Let's now shift to a very common belief of "investors": foreseeing this crisis, we've piled up "hard money" assets that are safely hidden from the grubby, illegitimate grasp of authorities. When the crisis sweeps away the bubble, we'll still be rich, and we'll then scoop up all the bargain-priced assets, making ourselves even richer.
It gives me no pleasure to say the obvious: please don't be naive. Those who will be trying to save the system from collapse understand that every asset is only richly valued now because of the credit bubble. From their point of view, "investors" who are planning to preserve the bubble valuation of their assets and then emerge to snap up everything for pennies on the dollar are, well, the enemy.
Another widespread belief holds that the hyper-wealthy always sneak through the wormhole and emerge with all their goodies intact. This fosters the idea that if they can do it, so can I. History offers examples on both sides: the great estates of the wealthiest Romans did not survive intact when the empire crumbled (or put another way, when control of the shards shifted to a new elite).
As the bottom 99.5% feel the squeeze, their rage at those at the top not paying their fair share will rise exponentially, and the political pressure on authorities to go after the hyper-wealthy will become too intense to ignore. Many of those trying to save the system will have already had enough of coddled billionaires, bankers, and financier grifters.
Another conviction that will be revealed as naive is the faith that the rules will stay unchanged, allowing us to hoard our stash and emerge unscathed to scoop up the bargains offered by the less prescient. History is again rather definitive: the rules will change overnight, and continue changing, as needed. One "emergency measure" after another will be imposed and become normalized.
It's important to put ourselves in the shoes of those struggling with the impossible responsibility of keeping the system from collapsing. From their point of view, everyone trying to evade the wealth taxes, windfall taxes, special assessments, etc. are ungrateful whiners, as what will anyone have if the system collapses? We're doing you all a favor, taking only 10% in a wealth tax to preserve the 90% that remains yours.
Another point of naivete is what happens to obstructionists in a full-spectrum surveillance Corporate-state. China has shown other nation-states how to do it properly: every digital communication and transaction is monitored, and while VPNs and other gimmicks offer a few wormholes, the fundamental reality is: that it takes an awful lot of effort to not leave a trail of crumbs, and at some point, is it worth all the effort? It's much easier to just pay the wealth tax, the windfall tax, grumble about it, and move on to enjoy life as best we can.
In China, the local authorities politely invite transgressors to tea and offer suggestions to mend their ways and keep their noses clean. Those who insist on mucking up the works after the kind advice will be neutered one way or another.
The naivete also extends to ways to evade surveillance. We're all going to get by on barter. Really? Have you tried to exchange stuff with anonymous others? Like many encounters on online boards, people don't show up, they flake out or decide not to make the deal. It's tediously time-consuming and frustrating unless you already have a network of trusted contacts who do this kind of thing all the time.
In my experience, reciprocity with other trustworthy productive people works better than barter. Instead of haggling over price/value, just give stuff away. In a trusted network, whoever gets the free stuff will scrounge up something to give you for free in return. These networks tend to have a "node," an outgoing, friendly, trustworthy person who can find a welcoming home for whatever is being freely distributed, and pass around what's being given to those who gave freely of their surplus.
Another point of naivete is the belief that as an asset soars in value, the authorities will magically restrain themselves from noticing this juicy target. If we factor in history and human nature, we will conclude the opposite is more likely: the authorities will redouble their efforts to track and collect that which is Caesar's from those trying to evade the collection of everyone's "fair share."
Given the resources of the NSA et al., how plausible is it to think little old me is going to leave no digital crumbs as I go on my merry way? Thanks to the automation of data scraping, it's going to get easier and cheaper to scrape data looking for miscreants trying to avoid paying "their fair share."
The whole idea of a wealth tax is it's a tax on all wealth, held anywhere in the world. So burying assets offshore only works as long as the authorities turn a blind eye to tax havens. As pressures mount, trusting the eyes to remain blind might not be as "sure thing" as many seem to believe.
As specific assets soar in value, a "windfall tax" will become politically appealing. Since all this soaring wealth is unearned, shouldn't the fortunate owners pay a bit more due to the windfall nature of their unearned wealth? Of course, they should.
The key point to understand is the system will have to grab enough collateral to fund itself while collateral evaporates in the deflation of the Everything Bubble. This will truly be a case of TINA--there is no alternative. Desperation will drive policy extremes few think of as possible, much less inevitable.
Something else that may be revealed as naive is the faith that moving to another nation-state will offer secure respite from those demanding we render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's. This faith overlooks the global reach of these dynamics: rampant inflation, the debasement of currency, the increasingly desperate need for collateral and revenue to keep the system from imploding, the rising cost of risk and credit, the scarcity of collateral, and so on. How will the nation-state be moving to respond to these financial crises? What are the odds that they will magically escape the crisis, or come up with a painless solution that doesn't demand any sacrifices of residents? How secure will the rule of law and the wealth of foreigners be once push comes to shove?
In summary: to understand the next 8 to 10 years, start by having some sympathy for the fox and not just for the hare. Here we are, trying to save the system that everyone depends on, taking a modest 10% wealth tax, and the ungrateful wretches are whining and trying to evade paying their fair share.
Rather than attempt to evade Caesar's reach, a better strategy might be to go gray: blend in, look average: post photos of kittens and puppies, complain about the cost of groceries, drive a look-alike vehicle, live in an unremarkable house, render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, forget about emerging as one of the rich who evaded Caesar and get on with enjoying one's private life focused on well-being, and as difficult as it may be, work up a little gratitude for those carrying the responsibility for keeping the system from collapsing. A system that degrades but coheres is a far better place to live than a system that completely collapses.
It gives me no joy to suggest please don't be naive, but a realistic appraisal of what happens when things unravel suggests there are few limits on "emergency measures" anywhere on the planet and it's best to plan accordingly and focus on what we can control rather than what we can't control.
For more on this approach, here are free excerpts of my book on self-reliance.
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