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Ever since day-one of the predictably disastrous and politically myopic insanity of weaponizing the world reserve currency against a major power like Russia, we warned that the USD had reached an historical turning point of slow demise and increasing de-dollarization.

We also warned that this would be a gradual process rather than over-night headline, much like the slow but steady death of the USD’s purchasing power since Nixon left the gold standard in 1971:

But as we’ll discover below, this gyrating process is happening even faster than we could have imagined, and all of this bodes profoundly well for physical gold, yet not so well for the USD.

Bad Actors, Bad Policies & Predictable Patterns

Regardless of what the media-mislead world thinks of Putin, weaponizing the USD was a foreseeable disaster which, naturally, none of DC’s worst-and-dimmest, could fully grasp.

This is because chest-puffing but math-illiterate neocons pushing policy from the Pentagon were pulling the increasingly visible strings of a Biden puppet at the White House.

In short, the dark state of which Mike Lofgren warned is not only dark, but dangerously dumb.

These political opportunists have forgotten that military power is not as wise as financial strength, which is why broke (and increasingly centralized nations) inevitably lead their country toward a state of permanent ruin preceded by cycles of war and currency-destroying inflation.

Sound familiar?

Despite no training in economics, Ernest Hemingway, who witnessed two world wars, saw this pattern clearly:

We also found “Biden’s” sanctions particularly comical, given that his former boss clearly understood the dangers of such a policy for the USD as far back as 2015:

…click on the above link to read the rest…

Fourth Turning 2022–Bad Moon Rising (Part 2)

January 25, 2022

FOURTH TURNING 2022 – BAD MOON RISING (PART 2)

In Part 1 of this article I laid out how the global elite have used this covid flu to manipulate the weak minded into a fear induced mass psychosis as a key element in their Great Reset plan to control the world and keep you technologically enslaved under lock and key. Now I will try to decipher how this mass hysteria might play out over the course of 2022 and beyond.

“Americans today fear that linearism (alias the American Dream) has run its course. Many would welcome some enlightenment about history’s patterns and rhythms, but today’s intellectual elites offer little that’s useful. Caught between the entropy of the chaoticists and the hubris of the linearists, the American people have lost their moorings.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

Federal Reserve Just Declared the American Dream is Dead for Most Americans

“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” ― George Orwell

The American Dream, where all Americans, no matter the circumstances of their birth, had a legitimate opportunity to live a better life than their parents, based upon their own intelligence, work ethic, and good fortune, is an illusion in today’s world. The ruling elite have stolen the wealth of the nation and its citizens. This was not an accident, but a plan implemented over many decades, accelerating after Nixon closed the gold window and opened the door to unlimited amounts of debt being created out of thin air and backed by nothing.

One of the Fed’s only mandates was to maintain a stable currency. Since its inception in 1913 to 2020, the USD had lost 96% of its purchasing power. The USD has lost 7.5% of its purchasing power since 2020, as Powell and his cronies have lost control of inflation.

Visualizing the Purchasing Power of the U.S. Dollar Over Time

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Weaponizing the Dollar

May 7, 2020

Weaponizing the Dollar

Don’t worry, we’re still talking virus, just from a slightly different angle. I was going to do something completely different, but then I saw an article at the South China Morning Post (SCMP) today that made me think “I don’t think that’s true”, realizing that at the same time many people would think it is.

Foreign holdings of US Treasuries are a misty environment for perhaps not just many, but most people. What triggered the SCMP piece is Trump’s threat, if it was ever meant to be one, to default on US dollar-denominated debt owned by China. Which by one estimate consists for about 70% of Treasuries.

And there are entire choirs full of voices willing to tell us that China can simply start dumping the -estimated- $1.2 trillion in Treasuries it holds, and threaten if not end the USD reserve currency status that way, if the US doesn’t “behave”. There’s little doubt that China would want this, but that doesn’t make the idea any more realistic.

What should give that away is, how easy can we make it for you, that it hasn’t done so yet. And now a conflict over the origin of a virus would trigger this? On a side note: if that origin is somewhere in China, even if it’s unintentional, how could Beijing possibly “admit” to it? How could it ever settle the lawsuits that would ensue?

No, the US cannot default on China’s holdings of its Treasuries. That alone would be a larger threat to the reserve currency status than anything anybody else could do, other then nuclear war. But at the same time, China cannot dump its Treasury holdings. because that would hurt … China.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What Happens When the Financial Capital of the World Moves?

June 15, 2019

What Happens When the Financial Capital of the World Moves?

QUESTION:

Hi Marty,

Knowing that the financial capital will likely move to China after 2032, since that would be the peak of the public wave, where will someone in the US put their capital?

Usually, the move from public to private would result in a move into sovereign debt and cash, but will the move after 2032 be different given the sovereign debt and monetary crisis we will be going through these next few years.

Thanks!

ANSWER: Britain was the Financial Capital of the World until World War I. This chart illustrates what happened to Britain and how it lost that stature of being the Financial Capital of the World — it was debt. The people in Britain did not lose everything. What really happened was that the separatist movement emerged and the British Empire began to break up.

Look at the British pound during the American Civil War. It was the rally in the pound that began the breakup of the British Empire, as I have warned will happen to the US dollar. That rise in the pound exported DEFLATION to the British Empire and the economic conditions led to the start of separatist movements. Canada won its independence on July 1, 1867. The second major wave of separatist movements came with the end of World War II. India won its independence on August 15, 1947.

The United States will be at risk of also breaking apart under economic conditions, which will fuel both the religious and political battles between left and right. There will be a high probability that the United States will break into regional groups, probably four major regions in general. It does not mean life will come to an end or that we all have to run and hide in a cave. The British survived as will Americans. If we understand the cycle, we will be better positioned to survive with security.

The Road to 2025 (Part 3) – USD Dominated Financial System Will Fall Apart

April 21, 2018

The Road to 2025 (Part 3) – USD Dominated Financial System Will Fall Apart

It’s our currency, but it’s your problem.

– U.S. Treasury Secretary John Connelly to European Finance Ministers, 1971

Today’s post will cover a topic that consumed my thoughts for many years, but one I haven’t discussed much lately. Namely, the terminal nature of a global financial system being propped up artificially by central bank shenanigans.

First, it’s crucial to understand that at the very core of our global economy is a financial system dominated by the U.S. dollar. The USD is a fiat currency directly backed by nothing, the supply of which can be arbitrarily altered and manipulated by a group of unelected bureaucrats in charge of the Federal Reserve. This money system represents the most powerful tool of centralized power on planet earth.

The USD is unique in that it grants the U.S. the “exorbitant privilege” of having a national currency which at the same time serves as the global reserve currency. This was solidified toward the end of World War 2 with the Bretton Woods agreement, and was accepted because the U.S. agreed to offer sovereign nations holding dollars a right to exchange these dollars for gold at a fixed price. This fell apart in 1971, but was shortly replaced with an unofficial “petrodollar” system, which allowed the USD to remain the world reserve currency despite no longer being redeemable in gold.

Before moving on, I want to share a few excerpts from an article I read yesterday titled, The De-Dollarization in China:

Petrodollars emerged when Henry Kissinger dealt with King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, after “Black September” in Jordan.

The agreement was simple. Saudi Arabia had to accept only dollars as payments for the oil it sold, but was forced to invest that huge amount of US currency only in the US financial channels while, in return, the United States placed Saudi Arabia and the other OPEC neighbouring countries under its own military protection.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Modest Plan

January 25, 2018

A Modest Plan

Rembrandt van Rijn The Storm on the Sea of Galilee 1633
On March 18, 1990, the painting was stolen by thieves disguised as police officers. They broke into the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum in Boston, MA, and stole this painting, along with 12 other works. The paintings have never been recovered, and it is considered the biggest art theft in history. The empty frames still hang in their original location.

This is an article written by Dr. D, who last month wrote a series at the Automatic Earth entitled Bitcoin Doesn’t Exist.

It shouldn’t surprise you that bitcoin plays a cameo in his Modest -but actually quite grand- Plan as well.

Dr. D: With all the talk about the bubble market, people are once again saying Donald Trump is a fool, he should never have taken credit for a Dow that’s about to collapse. In addition, how does he think he can get away with claiming we have a great economy made greater? He said in the election the economy was terrible and the Dow was a bubble, that’s why he won.

But hold on: you have to remember, they’re politicians; they may be dishonest but they’re not stupid. Let’s try a scenario to see what they’re thinking:

We have a situation in the U.S. where 100 million people are out of the workforce, the real economy is on life-support, debt is crushing, and monetary velocity is at an all-time low. The Fed’s every effort at market-rigging, lowering rates and pumping in money, bailing out the banks and giving unearned interest for Fed deposits have run up both the housing market and the stock market, neither of which is their legal mandate. If either one goes higher, they’ll pop as workers, particularly millennials, have no income to buy houses, and stocks are levitating on just 5 insider-paid FAANG stocks.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

EXPOSED: CIA drug connection shows how they support USD and manipulate foreign markets

June 25, 2017

EXPOSED: CIA drug connection shows how they support USD and manipulate foreign markets

(GLOBALINTELHUB.COM) – 6/26/2017 — Drugs have been a part of human society forever – however far back you go, humans have used drugs in one form or another; medicine, recreation, spirituality (Shamans of simple tribes often ate psychedelics). In the world today there is an interesting schism between the puritan “America” and “Europe” about this issue – in Europe they consider drug addiction a health issue, and in places like Switzerland you can literally get strong narcotics like heroin from the Government. In America it’s the opposite, there is an exploding prison population for small non-violent offenses. But as with many things in America there are lots of ironies and hypocrisies, America also has the highest per capita rate of users of legal pharmaceuticals ‘drugs’ – and is one of the only countries in the world where drug companies are allowed to advertise on TV (In Europe you won’t see commercials for Prozac, Viagra, or other questionably useful drugs).

As the CIA represents the main head of the octopus that controls America’s society on behalf of their Illuminati owners, it is only fitting that the CIA has its hand in the international drug trade. It is also an interesting side note that since its early days the CIA has been interested in drugs for the use of interrogation, mind control, crowd control, and other purposes. In fact there have been suggestions based on circumstantial evidence that the entire ‘hippie’ movement came straight out of a CIA drug lab vis a vis Tim Leary and other affiliated icons.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

State Street: “Move Over Zero Hedge, There Is A New Bear In Town”

September 23, 2016

State Street: “Move Over Zero Hedge, There Is A New Bear In Town”

By Mr. Risk – State Street Global Markets

Unleash Volatility Beast

Thanks for nothing, central banks!

If central banks provided the prototypical inflection point, risk assets should get destroyed next week.
Feast your eyes on a compendium of volatility charts. The beast wants out.
Keys to watch: DXY, EURAUD, and 10-year yields. Move over ZEROHEDGE. There is a new BEAR in town,

* * *

Ahead of the BOJ and Fed meetings, volumes slowed to a trickle, traders got back to flat, and algos reached for the offswitch. Now that event risk is in the rear view mirror, it is time to vote. Buy-the-dip or ‘‘sell everything?’’ If classic market reflexes are in play, a market meltdown following the passing of event risks is by far the more likely outcome. That US equities launched higher is nothing, because it always does that on Fed day. The obligatory central bank forensic is a good place to begin.

Expectations as measured by overnight volatility ahead of the BOJ were the third highest in 3-years. Notably, 7 out of the 10 highest readings have occurred in 2016, which says something about the growing perception about policy failure. Expanding monetary base has not delivered higher inflation expectations or a weaker currency. Just about every 2016 meeting USDJPY sunk like the proverbial stone.

The ‘‘monetary assessment’’ conducted by the BOJ was an admission that QQE was unsustainable, and needed to be tweaked. Plan B is ‘‘QQE with yield curve control.’’ No, that is not a new shampoo. Here is the stripped down ghetto-economist version.

Negative interest rate
Stabilize 10-year yields at 0%
Keep asset purchases at ¥80 tn/year
Abandon monetary base target
Aim to overshoot the 2.0% inflation target
Rebalance ETF by buying less Nikkei 225 linked ETFs and more Topix, removing a well-flagged distortion.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Japan Desperately Needs a Stronger Dollar, China Desperately Wants a Weaker Dollar: The Fed Can’t Please Both

April 10, 2016

Japan Desperately Needs a Stronger Dollar, China Desperately Wants a Weaker Dollar: The Fed Can’t Please Both

The FX market is about to blow up in the Fed’s face, and there’s nothing they can do about it.

Foreign exchange (FX) is a zero-sum game: if one currency weakens, another must strengthen. Since the value of a currency is relative to other currencies, all currencies can’t weaken together: at least one currency must strengthen as others weaken.

That one strengthening currency has been the U.S. dollar (USD) since mid-2014. The USD has strengthened by 20%, while the Japanese yen and the euro weakened by 20%. Many developing-economy currencies (rand, peso, real, etc.) have fallen off a cliff, suffering 40% to 50% (or even more) declines against the U.S. dollar.

Why does any of this matter? Simply put, the stock market is a monkey on a leash held by central banks–just give the leash a little tug, and the monkey jumps. Bonds are a gorilla–harder to control, but still manageable–but foreign exchange is King Kong, trading $5 trillion a day and impossible to control beyond short-term manipulations.

Currencies set the underlying trend, not just for bonds and stocks, but for entire economies. A weakening currency makes a nation’s exports cheaper in other countries, and the theory is that expanding exports will boost the overall economy–especially if that economy is stagnating or in recession.

A weakening currency also makes imports more expensive in the domestic economy, pushing inflation higher–precisely what every central bank in the world desires, on the theory that inflation will make people spend more (since their money is losing value) and reduce the costs of borrowing (which is presumed to stimulate more borrowing and spending).

This is why everybody seems to want a weaker currency. But as noted above, every currency can’t go down; if some weaken, others have to strengthen.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Cheap Oil, the U.S. Dollar and the Deep State

March 9, 2016

Cheap Oil, the U.S. Dollar and the Deep State

March 9, 2016

All this is to suggest that those expecting a major weakening in the USD to push oil higher shouldn’t hold their breath awaiting this outcome.

That oil fell off a cliff once the U.S. dollar (USD) began its liftoff in mid-2014 is, well, interesting. Causation, correlation or coincidence? There are a variety of opinions on this, as there should be. What we do know is the soaring USD blew up a bunch of carry trades that borrowed money denominated in USD and invested the cash in emerging markets paying much higher yields. Here’s WTIC oil:

And here’s the USD Index:

We also know the Saudis announced that the kingdom would pump every barrel it could “to maintain market share,” which is generally understood to mean crush competitors such as Russia and U.S. shale producers.

We also know that storage facilities are almost full up (Oil Fundamentals Could Cause Oil Prices To Fall, Fast!).

We also know that global growth is slowing, so demand could weaken sharply going forward.

And lastly, we know that many oil exporters are heavily dependent on oil revenues to fund their oligarchy/monarchy/ruling elites, their military and their vast social welfare programs, which keep the restive masses from overthrowing the oligarchy, etc.

Here is the U.S., heavily indebted producers must pump or die, as they need every dime of revenue to service their vast debts.

If we add all this up– carry trades blowing up, weakening demand and heavy pressures to maintain production–we get a perfect set-up for a continued decline in oil.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

When Currency Pegs Break, Global Dominoes Fall

February 24, 2016

When Currency Pegs Break, Global Dominoes Fall

When a currency peg breaks, it unleashes shock waves of uncertainty and repricing that hit the global financial system like a tsunami.

The U.S. dollar has risen by more than 35% against other major trading currencies since mid-2014:

If all currencies floated freely on the global foreign exchange (FX) market, this dramatic rise would have easily predictable consequences: everything other nations import that is priced in dollars (USD) costs 35% more, and everything the U.S. imports from other major trading nations costs 35% less.

But some currencies don’t float freely on the global FX markets: they’re pegged to the U.S. dollar by their central governments. When a currency is pegged, its value is arbitrarily set by the issuing government/central bank.

For example, in the mid-1990s, the government/central bank of Thailand pegged the Thai currency (the baht) to the USD at the rate of 25 baht to the dollar.

Pegs can be adjusted up or down, depending on a variety of forces. But the main point is the market is only an indirect influence on the peg, not the direct price-discovery mechanism as it is with free-floating currencies.

If central states/banks feel their currency is becoming too strong via a vis the USD, they can adjust the peg accordingly.

Why do states peg their currency to the U.S. dollar? There are several potential reasons, but the primary one is to piggyback on the stability of the dollar without having to convince the market independently of one’s stability.

Another reason to peg one’s currency to the USD is to keep your currency weaker than the market might allow. This weakness helps make your exports to the U.S. cheap/ competitive with other nations that have weak currencies.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Rising Systemic Risk for all Markets

February 10, 2016

Rising Systemic Risk for all Markets

We are on the precipice of what can only be described as rising systemic risk for all markets. The Fed is now hinting that banks should prepare for NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES and this insanity of following the crowd is undermining the entire world economy. The increasingly unstable footing that we find ourselves standing upon is reflected in widening credit spreads demonstrating that CONFIDENCE is indeed collapsing. The EU Commission will no longer classify government bonds in bank balance sheets as “risk”. Banks would also have government bonds on par with “equity” yet government bonds have proven to be risky and are inferior to what would in some financial institutions result in an increased capital requirement. Turning to Goldman Sachs, we see the so called world’s greatest trader closed out its long-USD trade against a basket of Euro and Japanese yen with a potential loss of around 5% which is being bantered about on the street showing they too got this all wrong. This early 2016 destabilization is stopping out short gold positions but not replacing them with any buying conviction while the Euro trade of long Italian 5 year against short German 5 year has also turned into a blood-bath as the Euro finally rallied begrudgingly to reach our first resistance target in the mid-113 area.

Global economic growth has been anemic at best in the States but it is clearing turning down since 2015.75. This new world order of NEGATIVE INTEREST RATES is so insane and focused solely on trying to stimulate borrowing, it is undermining pensions and the elderly creating an economic storm of the century on the horizon, which is far worse that the Great Depression of the 1930s. Even the Japanese 10 Year bond has gone NEGATIVE demonstrating the total collapse in CONFIDENCE.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How Much Higher Can The U.S. Dollar Go?

November 26, 2015

How Much Higher Can The U.S. Dollar Go?

And what will the implications be?

megainarmy/Shutterstock

Let’s start our examination of the U.S. dollar (USD) by recalling the chart from my August 2014 essay, Why the Dollar Could Strengthen—A Lot. At that point, the USD had moved modestly off its lows, and had yet to challenge long-term resistance around 80.

Here’s the same chart of the Real Trade-Weighted U.S. Dollar Index now:

The USD broke out of its multi-year downtrend and soared above 100. Needless to say, the USD did in fact strengthen a lot. After that initial leg up, the dollar has remained in a consolidation range for much of 2015. Though it recently broke out of a wedge/triangle formation to the upside, it’s not yet clear if this is a definitive move higher or more consolidation.

Is the Dollar Rally Done?

So is the dollar rally done, or could it move higher?

The long-term chart above (Real Trade-Weighted U.S. Dollar Index) offers some clues.

Our first observation is that trends in the USD tend to last for some time, so if this rally follows the pattern of previous rallies, it’s unlikely to have run its course in one year.

Secondly, previous rallies paused for a multi-month consolidation period before launching upward for the second leg of the long-term rally.

Thirdly, the USD rose sharply to previous peaks and then round-tripped back to the 80 level.

This raises the question: How high could the dollar rise in this rally?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Fed Induced Farce

November 19, 2015

The Fed Induced Farce

The minutes from the last Fed meeting were released on Wednesday afternoon. The minutes, along with a squadron of jabbering Fed heads lying about the economy doing great, pretty much locked in the most talked about .25% interest rate increase in world history. Evidently the Wall Street titans of greed have convinced the muppets higher interest rates are great for stocks, as the market soared by 250 points. As institutional money exits the market on these rigged up days, the dumb money retail investor buys into the market with dreams of riches just like they did with Pets.com in 2000, McMansions in 2005, and Bear Stearns in 2007.

The Fed has lost any credibility they ever thought they deserved by delaying this meaningless insignificant interest rate increase for the last three years, so they will make this token increase in December come hell or high water. They want to give themselves some leeway for easing again when this debt saturated global economy implodes in the near future. The Fed is trapped by their own cowardice and capture by the Wall Street cabal. If they raise rates the USD will strengthen even more than it has already. The USD is already at 11 year highs. It has appreciated by 25% in the last year versus the basket of world currencies. The babbling boobs on the entertainment news channels authoritatively expound with a straight face about the rise in the dollar being due to our strong economic performance. It’s beyond laughable, as the economy has been sucking wind since the day the Fed turned off the QE spigot in October 2014.

Chart of the Day

Anyone with a working brain and an IQ over 100 (eliminates the bimbos and boobs on CNBC) can see the USD isn’t strengthening of its own accord.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Currency Wars, Battles, And Hostile Actions

September 22, 2015

Currency Wars, Battles, And Hostile Actions

With its recent miniscule 2% devaluation of the Yuan, media pundits noted that China had now also entered into the global currency war. What this comment implies is that other countries with the ability to issue or print their own currency, including the U.S., have been participating in a currency war by devaluing their own currency as a hoped for means to increase their country exports and thereby stimulate their economies. As China’s currency has been pegged to the USD, it had recently grown stronger as a byproduct of dollar’s recent dramatic strength. Accordingly, the peg that China used to tie-in to the dollar’s value had increased the Chinese yuan to a level that was hurting their exports. The resulting devaluation was China’s attempt to correct partially this unwelcome currency appreciation.

With FED’s past QE series of money printing, we have been at the forefront attempting to devalue our own currency as a means to improve our exports, reach the FED’s stated goal of increasing inflation which would produce higher GDP figures, allowing government officials to claim that economic growth or recovery is resuming. Not to be outdone, the European Central Bank has been purchasing weak credits from their banks, in order to make member bank financial solidity ratios appear stronger – which also requires substantially increasing its money supply. The largest and most outrageous example of intentional destruction in the value of its currency is Japan, which for nearly two decades has been on a mission to devalue its currency in order to stimulate inflation.

Currency expansion may seem like an ideal, benign solution to a country trying to stimulate its exports, but it does create a financial assault or loss to their trading partners. For example, China’s recent holding in excess of $1.3 trillion assets (until some recent sales of under $200 billion) from accumulated annual trade surpluses, would lose great value in its assets by the amount of such U.S. devaluation.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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