Category Archive: 6b.) Debt and the Fallacies of Paper Money

European Banks and Europe’s Never-Ending Crisis

Landfall of a “Told You So” Moment… Late last year and early this year, we wrote extensively about the problems we thought were coming down the pike for European banks. Very little attention was paid to the topic at the time, but we felt it was a typical example of a “gray swan” – a problem everybody knows about on some level, but naively thinks won’t erupt if only it is studiously ignored.

Read More »

Yahoo Finance Editor “We’re Suffering Of Too Much Democracy”

Following James Traub's mind-numbingly-elitist rebuttal of the democratic rights of "we, the people" in favor of allowing "they, the elite" to ensure the average joe doesn't run with scissors, "It's time for the elites to rise up against the ignorant masses."

Read More »

Planet Debt

She is a low-interest-rate person. She has always been a low-interest-rate person. And I must be honest. I am a low-interest-rate person. If we raise interest rates, and if the dollar starts getting too strong, we’re going to have some very major problems.

Read More »

Housing Affordability – A Dose of Reality

First, a few quick words on Brexit. Being the always positive and optimistic person that I am (big grin), I see one very positive outcome of Brexit – it is a revolution without bloodshed. For once, I’m not digressing. Brexit has a lot of parallels with housing affordability in the US.

Read More »

Mooning the Elite

Dow up 269 points. Was that all there was? Is the “Brexit” scare over? We don’t know… but we’re going to take a pause today. Instead of trying to connect the new dots, we’re going to take a look at the old dots we’ve already strung together

Read More »

Money confuses and blurs economic relations

Money, generally accepted medium of exchange, acts as a veil that confuse and blurs economic relations. This is especially true when it comes to intertemporal considerations. Whilst probably the most important institution in a free market, money can be highly destructive when politicized.

Read More »

The Coming End of the “Third Way” System

We recently discussed the post-Brexit landscape with a friend (in fact, our editor), who bemoaned that “the EU is led by a drunkard”. Our immediate reaction to this was to exclaim: “That’s the best thing about the EU!”

Read More »

Vive la Revolution! Brexit and a Dying Order

A Dying Order Last Thursday, the Brits said auf Wiedersehen and au revoir to the European Union. On Friday, the Dow sold off 611 points – a roughly 3.5% slump. What’s going on?

Read More »

The Fed Doomsday Device

Debt is just the flip side of credit. As debt goes bad, credit disappears. And then the system that created so much credit-money will go into reverse, destroying the nation’s money supply. The money supply (actually, the supply of ready credit) will shrink – suddenly and dramatically. And what should have been a minor, routine pullback in the economy will become a catastrophic panic.

Read More »

Janet Yellen’s $200-Trillion Debt Problem

More than $10 trillion of government bonds now trade at negative yields. And another $10 trillion or so worth of U.S. stocks trade well above their long-term average valuations. And there’s more than $200 trillion of debt in the world. All of this sits on the Fed’s financial applecart. Does Janet Yellen dare upset it?

Read More »

Gold and Brexit

The pain of negative yields and social chaos will be very long lasting and very good for gold. So, gold must go up, but Brexit is not one of the reasons why it should. This tells me that in the short term there will likely be a correction in the gold price, creating an opportunity to trade

Read More »

A Market Ready to Blow and the Flag of the Conquerors

The U.S. is too big, too varied, too much of everything. You can’t fix a single view of it, even in your mind. But now our problems, challenges, and discontents are big. They are national and international. We cannot see them. We cannot understand them. Instead, we draw their measure from the news media – based on a flag that flutters and sags, depending on which way the wind is blowing.

Read More »

How the Welfare State Dies

People have become used to the idea that the State is their sugar daddy. Many apparently believe that it has some undisclosed, infinite stash of resources at its disposal which it can shower them with at will. The reality is unfortunately different.

Read More »

Down Go the Hopes and Dreams of Three Generations

On Wednesday, Janet Yellen pressed on the broken buttons again. After the two day FOMC meeting, the Fed Chair announced they’d continue pressing the federal funds rate down to just a ¼ to ½ percent – effectively zero. What type of insanity is this? If she keeps it up, and whole thing doesn’t implode, the yield on the 10-Year Treasury note could also slip below zero…along with the hopes and dreams of three generations of retirees.

Read More »

The VIX Breaks Out – Market Risk Continues to Surge

  The Sharp Move in the VIX Accelerates In Monday’s trading session, the upward move in the volatility index VIX (which measures the implied volatility of SPX options) continued unabated, vastly out of proportion with the move in the underlying stock...

Read More »

Stocks Set Another Valuation Record

Believe It Or Not… There Actually Is Some Downside Risk BALTIMORE – Not much action in the stock market last week. A few little steps ahead to over the 18,000 line for the Dow. Then a few little steps back. Currently  the index sits at 17,732.   Th...

Read More »

Brexit Paranoia Creeps Into the Markets

European Stocks Look Really Bad… Late last week stock markets around the world weakened and it seemed as though recent “Brexit” polls showing that the “leave” campaign has obtained a slight lead provided the trigger. The idea was supported by a not...

Read More »

Is It Our Duty to Fight When the Deep State Asks?

  Hero or Traitor?   And it’s one, two, three, What are we fighting for? Don’t ask me, I don’t give a damn, Next stop is Vietnam; And it’s five, six, seven, Open up the pearly gates, Well there ain’t no time to wonder why, Whoopee! We’re all gonna di...

Read More »

What Congress Really Thinks of Voters

  Battle of Wits  BALTIMORE – On Wednesday, the Dow rose over 18,000, for the first time since April. Hillary is riding high, too. She is a pro. She has the entire Deep State behind her – including almost every crony and zombie in the country – and a...

Read More »

A Darwin Award for Capital Allocation

  Beyond Human Capacity Distilling down and projecting out the economy’s limitless spectrum of interrelationships is near impossible to do with any regular accuracy.  The inputs are too vast.  The relationships are too erratic.   The economy – comple...

Read More »