Monday, November 17, 2014

Carl Icahn: "One Day You'll See A Break Like A Few Weeks Ago But The Market Won't Come Back"


It seems Carl Icahn will not be going activist on the S&P500 after all. During the Reuters Investment Outlook Summit in New York on Monday, the 78 year old billionaire said that "I am still concerned that one day you'll see a break like you had a few weeks ago but it won't come back."



Mission Accomplished: Stocks & Homeless Kids Hit All-Time Highs

Something is dreadfully wrong in America.





Here Is Your "Global Recovery" In 24 Charts

No, this is not a joke.




"Godfather" Of Abenomics Admits Japanese Policy "Is A Ponzi Game... Taxpayers May Revolt"

“In a Ponzi game you exhaust the lenders eventually, and of course Japanese taxpayers may revolt. But otherwise there are always new taxpayers, so this is a feasible Ponzi game, though I'm not saying it's good.”



Japan Goes Full Helicopter-Ben: Prints "Free Gift-Cards" To Spark Consumption

Since Ben Bernanke reminded the world of the existence of government printing-presses, echoed Milton Friedman's "helicopter drop" solution to fighting deflation, and decried Japan for not being as insane as it could be... it has only been a matter of time before some global central bank decided that the dropping of cash onto the populace was the key to economic recovery. Having blown their wad on QQE (and been left with a triple-dip recession), it appears Japan has reached that limit. As Japan's News47 reports, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has instructed his cabinet to develop economic measures such as handing out 'gift certificates' to the poor to "support personal consumption directly."



America Truly Is Becoming A '1984' Society

If only George Orwell could see us today.  When he wrote “1984” back in 1948, he probably never imagined that the “totalitarian, bureaucratic world” that he imagined would ever actually become a reality.  But that is precisely what is happening. The control freaks that run our society are absolutely obsessed with watching, tracking, recording and monitoring virtually everything that we do.  We truly are becoming a “1984” society, and if we continue on the path that we are currently on eventually our world will be transformed into something more hellish than anything that George Orwell ever imagined.




Illinois Pension Debt Soars To $111 Billion

Pension debt in the Land of Lincoln is a big problem. So big, in fact, that it would take three years of a complete government shutdown, during which the entire general fund went toward pensions, just to break even. Illinois politicians have looted and mismanaged public-employee pension funds for decades. The system is no longer sustainable or affordable.
 



Are You a Silver Stacker? This Figure Will Make Your HEAD SPIN!

A Splash of Cold Water
from The Wealth Watchman:

Sometimes, it behooves us to revisit some basics, when valuations are strained beyond all limits of credibility and belief.  When you really need that splash of icy-cold water on your face, ya know?
Case in point, this past Friday, in episode 2 of the Clarion Call, I took some time fleshing out an astonishing dollar figure about silver.  If you’re a subscriber on the Watchman’s YouTube channel, then you’d already know what it is, and if you’re not, what are you waiting for? *nudge nudge*
Honestly though, the figure was so surreal to this Watchman, that I decided to flesh it out a great deal more in this article, to demonstrate just how precarious our enemy’s position has become in their silver suppression. I can’t stress enough how many times I’ve told our brothers, that this unforgiving downtrend in silver, which is now going on 4 years, has reached the point where valuations are so low, that just a handful of committed people, can really do some serious damage to the riggers.
Read More…

Legend Warns Gold To See Massive Surge Above $2,000

from KingWorldNews:
I just put out a report titled ‘Winter Is Coming.’ This report focuses on the opportunity for investors as well the global problems that remain unresolved. For investors, the high quality mining shares have 10-times upside potential from current levels. The sentiment in the mining shares is extremely negative, and the long-term relative strength in this group is almost at zero. This is an incredibly rare set up.
In the midst of all this negative sentiment, China continues to buy gold. The Russians also continue to be big buyers of gold. The Russians are now the 5th largest holder of gold in the world, ahead of even China — who’s last reported figures date back to 2009. So central banks are still buying gold and it’s just a matter of time before we get a substantial move higher in the price.
John Ing continues @ KingWorldNews.com


Elliott Wave analyst sees big gold and silver price surge ahead

by Lawrence Williams, MineWeb.com
As usual the bank analysts are great at making forward price predictions based almost entirely on the current performance of whatever commodity they are analysing. It means they almost all inevitably miss any major turning points in price performance. This is particularly true of those forecasting precious metals prices and recently, given the sharp price falls which took gold down to around $1140, silver to $15 and platinum to below $1180, many of the banks have been rapidly adjusting their forward price predictions ever lower.
But there are others out there who see a different picture, often based on historic technical performance which tends to repeat over and over throughout long periods of history. Perhaps foremost among these are those who follow Elliott Waves…
Read More @ MineWeb.com


The Great EU Farce Will End Soon

by Graham Summers, Gold Seek:
Mario Draghi once again surfaced this morning to promise to do “whatever it takes” to help the Eurozone. Draghi has done this anytime the EU markets drop ever since the bottom in the summer of 2012. It’s amazing to watch, particularly when you consider that it is now public information that Draghi actually didn’t have a plan when he first claimed this and is effectively making up policy on the fly. Here are Draghi’s comments from this morning:
*DRAGHI SAYS ECB WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES, WITHIN ITS MANDATE

*DRAGHI SAYS EXPANDED PURCHASE PROGRAM COULD INCLUDE GOVT BONDS
Note, that the first statement contains the qualifier “within its mandate.” Of course traders and investors won’t bother to consider that the ECB’s mandate DOESN’T ALLOW IT TO BUY SOVEREIGN BONDS.
Read More @ GoldSeek.com


How Much Earmarked Gold Holds The Federal Reserve?

from Gold Silver Worlds:
Nick Laird at Sharelynx has recently complied historical data from multiple sources on the amount of earmarked (custodial) gold held by the US Federal Reserve Bank for other central banks. The chart below shows these stocks, in green, as well as the US’ gold reserves (in blue) and in red is an estimate by the Fed (pre confiscation) of gold held in the US by citizens and others. It provides a broad historical view of monetary gold in the US.
First feature to note is the privately held/circulating gold stocks figure in red. Up to 1915 we see that the gold held by government was stable and it was privately held gold that was growing. After this, the amount of gold in circulation as a proportion of total monetary gold reduced with the introduction of the Federal Reserve System. It ceased completely at the point holding gold was made illegal.
Read More @ GoldSilverWorlds.com


Obamacare = A Death Panel For The U.S. Economy

by Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse Blog:
Did you know that some Americans are being hit with health insurance rate increases of more than 500 percent?  Taking advantage of “the stupidity of the American voter”, the Democrats succeeded in ramming through one of the worst pieces of legislation that has ever come before Congress.  The full implementation of Obamacare has been repeatedly delayed, but now we are finally starting to see the true horror of this terrible law.  Thanks to Obamacare, millions of American families are losing health plans that they were very happy with, health insurance rates are skyrocketing, millions of workers are having their full-time hours cut back to part-time hours, rural hospitals all over the country are dying, and thousands of doctors are being driven out of the industry thus intensifying the greatest doctor shortage in U.S. history.  Obamacare is a slow-motion train wreck of epic proportions, and the full effect of this law is only beginning to be felt.  In the end, the economic impact of this law will likely be measured in the trillions of dollars.
Read More…


Sunday, November 16, 2014

THE MONEY IN YOUR BANK ACCOUNT WAS STOLEN THIS MORNING

by Dave Hodges, The Common Sense Show:
The headline is not a mistake. Yes, you can still go to the ATM and withdraw funds. You can take small amounts of cash out of the bank without the IRS seizing everything you own. However, because of new rules that went into effect this morning, your bank deposits have no insurance and it is a matter of time until they are stolen right from under your nose.
The G20 Just Stole Your Bank Account: With the G-20 summit coming up this weekend in Brisbane, Australia, it might be worth wondering if you can have too much money in the bank, or, whether you should any money in the bank at all!
As of this morning all nations belonging to the G20 will immediately submit and pass legislation that will fulfill a new investment program. This new program creates a whole new paradigm and set of rules whereby banks will no longer recognize your deposits as money.
Read More…



Obama Comments On Grubergate: "I Did Not Mislead Americans" Even As Gruber Pocketed Millions

When a member of the press dared to ask Obama if the head of the "most hypocritical transparent administration ever" "misled Americans" about the taxes and about keeping the plan "in order to get the bill passed" the response was "No, i did not." This was Obama's conclusion after he had just gotten "well-briefed before he came out here." Indeed, nothing escapes the American president who continued: "The fact that some adviser who never worked on our staff expressed an opinion that I completely disagree with in terms of the voters is no reflection on the actual process that was run." Unfortunately, because Obama apparently wasn't briefed quite as well as he would have hoped, let's just take a look at what Dr. Gruber did do.
 



State Department Hacked, Shuts Down Worldwide Email System

As the G-20 meeting comes to a 'successful' end with back-patting congratulations having agreed to create $2 trillion more GDP out of thin air (or maybe hookers and blow), it appears that someone - or more than one - among these nations was less than diplomatic towards every nations' best friend - America. As AP reports, The State Department has taken the unprecedented step of shutting down its entire unclassified email system as technicians repair possible damage from a suspected hacker attack. Earlier attacks have been blamed on Russian or Chinese attackers, although their origin has never been publicly confirmed.
 



Ukraine Bank Runs Begin As Poroshenko Plans To Sever Socio-Economic Ties With Separatist-Held Regions

In what the pro-Russian separatists call "an act of genocide," Ukraine's President Poroshenko signed a decree Friday that will explicitly withdraw state support for the regions within a month. While appearing to implicitly recognize the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk as autonomous, the decree means that the central bank will no longer service bank accounts, prisoners will be transferred (inmates with minor offences will be released), and perhaps most troubling as the cold winter begins, the order covers all public services, including crucial ones, such as schools, hospitals, and emergency services; and local heating and power plants will be subject to new laws that could involve cutting energy supplies altogether to the plants that don’t pay. Luhansk's leader exclaimed, "the total socio-economic blockade of Donbass is de facto an act on genocide and devastation of our people," and as the images below show, bank runs have already begun across the region with long lines forming at ATMs.
 

Putin Is the Biggest Gold Bug

from Bloomberg.com:
Switzerland is preparing to hold a referendum on whether to keep 20 percent of its international reserves in gold. Meanwhile, Russia, which would never ask its citizens to weigh in on such matters, is increasing its gold holdings. It accounted for 59 percent of net gold purchases by central banks in the third quarter of 2014, according to the World Gold Council. Russia has been increasing its stockpile since the global financial crisis, and the more recent Western sanctions — – which the European Union said today might be strengthened — have only confirmed to Russian policy makers that they’re doing the right thing.
Central banks have been net buyers of gold since 2010:
Read More @ Bloomberg.com


The Reverse Of Central Bank Gold Flows Spells The Death Of The Dollar

from SRS Rocco:
Something BIG changed after the collapse of the U.S. Investment and Housing Markets as a huge crack in the Fiat Monetary System took place. After the world nearly disintegrated under the debt-based U.S Dollar system in 2008, some of the Central Banks of the world finally found MONETARY RELIGION.
At this time, and according to some of the more enlightened Central Banks, gold was no longer a worthless piece of metal whose sole purpose in government was to be pawned off to support a worthless paper monetary system. In just a few years time, the huge flood of Central Bank gold into the market dried up and switched to become a large source of demand.
Read More…


Undercover Operations Growing In ‘Every Corner Of The Federal Government’: New York Times

by Nadia Prupis, The News Doctors:
Undercover operations, once the domain of the FBI, have expanded to “virtually every corner of the federal government,” a New York Times investigation published Saturday found—and the scope of those missions has become so wide that it risks abusing civil liberties and possible entrapment of targets.
Officers from at least 40 agencies played various roles in the operations—student protesters, doctors, business people, and welfare recipients among them—to investigate “wrongdoing,” according to the Times. At the Internal Revenue Service, for example, officers posed as accountants to investigate tax evasion.
Read More @ TheNewsDoctors.com


The Real Reason Why Germany Halted Its Gold Repatriation From The NY Fed

from Zero Hedge:
“… the gold community paid great attention to the decision of the German Bundesbank to “bring German gold home”. At the beginning of 2013, the Bundesbank announced it would repatriate 300 tonnes of gold stored in the US by 2020. It is well behind schedule, citing logistical difficulties. Yet diplomatic difficulties are more likely to be the chief cause of the delay, especially seeing as the Bundesbank has proven its capacity to organise large-scale gold transports. In the early 2000s, the Bundesbank incrementally repatriated 930 tonnes of German gold held by the Bank of England.”
Read More @ ZeroHedge.com


Maybe You Aren’t Actually Gluten Intolerant. Maybe You’re Just Poison Intolerant

by Daisy Luther, The Organic Prepper:
Over the past couple of years, I had the unpleasant experience of having bloodwork done to confirm that I am gluten intolerant, only to have it come back and say, “Nope, you’re just crazy.”
The same thing happened to my good friend Melissa Melton, who was terribly ill before she cut wheat out of her life.
It’s happened to scores of other people, who pass the test for the anti-gliadin antibodies but still know that their health issues directly correlate with what they eat.
Now we may know why.
Read More @ TheOrganicPrepper.com



9 Of The Biggest Myths People Believe About 'The System'

In The West today we see mass delusion everywhere. People seem to believe their governments are almighty beings capable of performing magic - water into wine, debt into wealth. Here are some of the biggest myths we see in the system today...
 



Saturday, November 15, 2014

Putin Arrives At G-20 Meeting Escorted By 4 Warships; Sent Clear 'Message' By World Leaders


Having been 'guest-of-honor' at the APEC Summit the previous week, it appears Russian President Vladimir Putin is getting the 'Obama-at-APEC' treatment at the G-20 meeting in Brisbane. Following his 'odd' shaped convoy of protection last week, The Independent reports Putin chose a different type of entourage this week as he headed to meet the world's leaders. Putin has stationed four warships close to Australian waters as he arrived in Australia. Having drawn ridicule from no lesser wit than Britain's David Cameron who sarcastically bleeted, "I didn't feel it necessary to bring a warship myself to keep myself safe at this G20, and I’m sure that Putin won’t be in any danger," when it came time for the team photo, it was clear what 'message' was being sent...



Glenn Greenwald On Hillary Clinton: "Soulless, Principle-Free, Power Hungry..."

"As a drearily soulless, principle-free, power-hungry veteran of DC’s game of thrones, she’s about as banal of an American politician as it gets."




David Stockman Warns, They Don't Ring A Bell At The Top

Needless to say, this relentless expansion of the bubble eventually kills off the bears, the skeptics, the prudent and even the militantly incredulous. Undoubtedly, that is where we are now because the global economic news has been uniformly negative since the October dip, yet the market has resumed its relentless melt-up. Under such circumstances, therefore, it is well to remember that we are in the middle of the greatest central bank fueled inflation in recorded history, and that this insidious inflation has been channeled into financial assets owing to the arrival of peak debt everywhere around the world. But that is the Achilles heel of the game. As the bubble takes on ever greater girth, it becomes increasingly susceptible to a negative shock to confidence. 




Martin Armstrong Blasts "We Need To Restructure The World Now!"

We need to restructure the world economy - right this very instant. The US economy is holding up the entire world economy right now and the growth rate is minimal. When we turn the economy down, look out below. These morons have been hunting taxes everywhere and as a result they have shut down global capital flows. Government lives in an illusion. These idiots have destroyed the world economy and we will understand the full impact soon.



When Did “Dickhead” Become Part Of Federal Reserve Jargon?





 



Russia Is Preparing For A "Catastrophic" Oil Price Collapse

Vladimir Putin told the state-run TASS news agency that Russia's economy faces a potential "catastrophic" slump in oil prices, saying, as Bloomberg reports, such a scenario is "entirely possible, and we admit it." However, Putin reassures that with reserves at more than $400 billion, the country will weather such a turn of events because "we handle our gold and currency reserves and government reserves sparingly."



BRICS discuss ratification of new Bank, $100 bn CRA

from The BRICS Post:
Leaders of the five BRICS nations have met in Brisbane on Saturday ahead of the annual G20 Summit, aimed at boosting trade and economic ties between the group.
The leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, South African President Jacob Zuma and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff discussed ratifying the newly formed $100 billion BRICS Bank and the $100 billion Contingency Reserve Arrangement (CRA) by parliaments in the five countries.
“They [the BRICS leaders] asked their Finance Ministers to designate the President and the Vice-Presidents of the NDB well in advance of the next BRICS Summit in Russia. The Leaders also announced the setting up of an Interim Board of Directors that will lead the next phase establishing NDB,” said a joint statement issued after the meet.
Read More @ TheBRICSPost.com




Jim Willie – Stealth QE4: Operation Tokyo Twist

by Jim Willie, GoldSeek:
Simply put, QE can never be halted or even slowed. The USFed is in a corner, with no policy options, facing collapse, with no ability whatsoever to halt the systemic failure in progress. It can only rely on hidden machinery and profound lies, against a background of constant economic propaganda. The central bank franchise system wrapped around the fiat paper currency regime has failed. They cannot stop it, not even with endless bond fraud and endless war, the new twin towers of the fascist state legacy. The entire financial structures have become fully dependent on easy money and debt financed by a printing press, buttressed by derivative machinery. The Uncle Sam bearing the USDollar emblem is like a pathetic heroin addict brandishing a modern howitzer. The USDollar is fast losing its integrity, during a dangerous global rejection episode. Therefore, QE must be exported, the easy candidate Japan. Call it Operation Tokyo Twist.
Read More…



Ebola Outbreak Caused By New Strain Never Before Seen

by Christina Sarich, Natural Society:
The Ebola virus has caused fear of outbreaks in the US amid its devastation of Africa. Turns out, the virus is a totally different, potentially more lethal strain than any other Ebola virus seen before, according to noted infectious disease experts. Virologists are saying that the current Ebola strain appears to be far worse than any previous strain and it is not one that scientists have seen previously. So where did it come from?
Dr. Michael Osterholm, the head of the Center for Infection Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, reported that top Ebola virologist Gary Kobinger said that “the current Ebola strain appears to be far worse than any previous strain” and that “the current strain could more easily be spread through aerosols than those previously identified.”
Read More @ NaturalSociety.com




Super-Amnesty Will Turn Every City into Detroit

from Freedom Outpost:

After another bloody weekend in Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel branded the shootings unacceptable and the city’s top cop demanded more gun control laws. Chicago’s murder rate has actually dropped since concealed carry became legal. Emanuel’s lawsuits over his illegal gun control laws have left the already struggling city deep in the hole and forced to cover the NRA’s million dollars in legal bills.
Concealed carry paid off over that bloody weekend when a vet carrying a gun returned fire stopping a massacre before it happened. The original shooter ended up in the hospital, but nobody ended up in the morgue, which kept the death toll for the weekend down to fourteen.
Read More @ FreedomOutpost.com



Friday, November 14, 2014

Dollar Dump Sparks Safety Scramble For Bonds & Bullion



Stocks were somewhat of a sideshow to the moves in Bonds, commodities, and FX today. Trannies (Airlines) and Nasdaq (AAPL) led on the week with Small Caps the laggard and Dow/S&P not much better. A 6-7bps plunge in yields from around 10am ET today left Treasury yields only 0-2bps higher on the week. The USD dumped at around the same time, cracking back to unchanged on the week as USDJPY failed at 117. While oil prices lifted modestly today, WTI Crude fell 3.2% this week - 7th week in a row - longest losing streak since 1986 (the last time US oil production was above 9 mm bbl/d). Silver screamed over 7% off its intraday lows today (+4.1% on the day - the best day in 5 months) and gold surged 2.4% on the day (4.1% off the lows) for its 2nd best day in 5 months.  VIX (higher on the week), HY credit, and TSYs all diverged notably on the week from equity 'strength' but today's moves were seemingly driven by Swiss Gold Initiative rumors. It's a Friday so 330ET saw the standard ramp to grab the S&P green and record close (+0.02%)



"No, Taxes Are Not What We Pay For Civilized Society"

“Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.” The famous quote by US Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. is inscribed above the entrance to the headquarters of the IRS. Most people don’t have a clue what he meant, or in what context the statement was made. They simply parrot it around to justify the state’s racketeering behavior. The logic is as twisted as saying “war is the price we pay for peace” or “debt is the price we pay for recovery.” They’re all logical fallacies, and assertions backed by zero objective evidence. This is not how a ‘civilized society’ conducts itself.
 



Depression-Level Collapse In Demand: In Historic First, Glencore Shuts Coal Mines For 3 Weeks

In a historic move showing just how profound the collapse in global commodity demand and trade is, earlier today the Sydney Morning Herald reported that Australia's biggest coal exporter Glencore, which last year concluded its merger with miner Xstrata creating the world's fourth largest mining company and world's biggest commodity trader, will suspend its Australian coal business for three weeks "in a move never before seen in the Australian market, to avoid pumping tonnes into a heavily oversupplied market at depressed prices." Putting this shocking move in context, it is something that was avoided even during the depths of the global depression in the aftermath of Lehman's collapse, and takes place at a time when the punditry will have you believe that the US will decouple from the rest of the world and grow at 3% in the current quarter and in 2015.



Stephen Roach Warns The Fed's Fixation With Markets Is "A Potentially Deadly Trap"

The Fed remains fixated on financial-market feedback – and thus ensnared in a potentially deadly trap. Fearful of market disruptions, the Fed has embraced a slow-motion exit from QE. By splitting hairs over the meaning of the words “considerable time” in describing the expected timeline for policy normalization, Fed Chair Janet Yellen is falling into the same trap. Such a fruitless debate borrows a page from the Bernanke-Greenspan incremental normalization script of 2004-2006. Sadly, we know all too well how that story ended.


 


Hyperinflation in the U.S.?

by Dr, Jeffrey Lewis, Silver-coin-investor:
“WAR is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.” -General Smedley Butler, USMC
“Let me issue and control a nation’s money and I care not who writes the laws.” -Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744-1812), founder of the House of Rothschild
Recently I have been discussing with my cousin, who collects paper currency, which holds better value: gold/silver coin, or paper currency.
Read More @ Silver-coin-investor.com


Brics GDP bigger than G7 in purchasing power: Putin

from The BRICS Post:
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday said Moscow wants to work with other countries to “remove the imbalances in the global economy”.
In Vladivostok on Friday, Putin said the GDP of the BRICS countries calculated at the purchasing power parity is greater than that of the G7, the Group of major industrialized nations.
“As far as I know, the GDP of BRICS is $37.4 trillion, while that of the G7 is $34.5 trillion. And if we go and say: ‘No, thank you, we are going to do this and that here on our own, and you can do it the way you want it,’ this will only add to the imbalances. If we are really set to resolve some issues, we should do that together,” he told Russian agency Itar Tass.
Read More @ TheBRICSPost.com


OBAMA IS CURRENTLY PLACING THE U.S. IN A CORPORATE CONTROLLED POLICE STATE DICTATORSHIP

by Dave Hodges, The Common Sense Show:
While the United States is fully preoccupied with global crises ranging from the fight against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the spread of Ebola and the conflict in Ukraine, there is another development on the world stage which threatens the economic health of every single American and American based business. Specifically, I am referencing the Trans Pacific Partnership. The protocols of the TPP establishes a free-trade zone/bloc stretching from Vietnam to Chile and Japan. The most draconian free trade agreement in history includes nearly a billion people which encompass almost 40% of the world’s economy. Since Obama failed to fast-track the TPP into law last year, he has made amazing progress and America is nearing its fate with destiny
As America races toward her date with destiny, there is yet another “fundamentally transforming” event coming her way and that event is known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
Read More @ Thecommonsenseshow.com


Stockman – This Will Dislocate Every Market In The World

from KingWorldNews:
Eric King: “What the Bank of Japan just did, you obviously had a big piece that you put together on that (unprecedented move). Aren’t Europe and the United States going to have to respond to that with their own money printing? They can’t just let Japan lead the race to the bottom (in the currency wars). And doesn’t that force the other Asian countries to print more money as well?”
Stockman: “Exactly. This is getting downright stupid. As I said the other day, ‘The Bank of Japan jumped the shark.’ The idea that they are going to create balance sheet, or liquidity, at the rate $3 trillion a year, when you look at the equivalent in terms of a U.S. sized economy, when they have already massively expanded their balance sheet, is almost hard to believe….
Victor Sperandeo continues @ KingWorldNews.com



Congress Passes Keystone XL Pipeline Bill, Senate Can't Block, Obama Veto To Come?

As somewhat expected the House passed the Keystone XL Pipeline approval bill:
*HOUSE PASSES KEYSTONE APPROVAL BILL 252-161; SENATE VOTE NOV 18
It is relatively clear that the Senate does not have the votes to be able to overturn and thus it will be forced on to President Obama's desk - "to veto" or "not to veto."
 




Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Russell Napier Declares November 16, 2014 The Day Money Dies


On Sunday in Brisbane the G20 will announce that bank deposits are just part of commercial banks’ capital structure, and also that they are far from the most senior portion of that structure. With deposits then subjected to a decline in nominal value following a bank failure, it is self-evident that a bank deposit is no longer money in the way a banknote is. If a banknote cannot be subjected to a decline in nominal value, we need to ask whether banknotes can act as a superior store of value than bank deposits? If that is the case, will some investors prefer banknotes to bank deposits as a form of savings? Such a change in preference is known as a "bank run."



The 1937 Recession

This Austrian School interpretation of events fits the facts rather better than the monetarist account.  The lesson for policymakers today is uncomfortable.  For, on this view, if there is a parallel with the 1930s, the damage has already been done.  It was done when the Fed allowed funds available for investment in capital markets to balloon, not this time through unsterilized gold inflows but through its QE experiment.
 




Did The BoJ Quietly Peg The Yen To Gold?

For 14 years, as Japan's economic demise grew more and more evident, its currency devalued relative to gold (the only non-fiat numeraire). When Abenomics began, the trend began to stabilize... but for the last year or so - as The Fed tapered - JPY and Gold have practically flatlined around 132,000 JPY per ounce. This 'odd' stability stands in strangely stark contrast to the volatility and trends in the USD, JPY, and Gold over this period. Even amid the collapse in JPY in recent weeks, it has remained firmly inside a 3% envelope of the 'peg'.



War-Making And Class-Conflict

Because the masses in a democratic polity are deeply imbued with the ideology of egalitarianism and the myth of majority rule, the ruling elites who control and benefit from the state recognize the utmost importance of concealing its oligarchic and exploitative nature from the masses. Continual war making against foreign enemies is a perfect way to disguise the naked clash of interests between the taxpaying and tax-consuming classes.




The St.Louis Fed Explains Why Banking Panics Are More Likely Under A Gold Standard

The U.S. and many other economies left the gold standard more than 40 years ago, yet advocates periodically call for its return, saying that it would curtail or prevent inflation. In these brief clips from the St. Louis Fed video series, David Andolfatto, a vice president and economist explains the gold standard noting "most economists believe a return to the gold standard would not be a wise policy," and "under the gold standard, banking panics are more likely to occur," and then pointing out somewhat stunningly that "however, the fiat system employed by the Federal Reserve has been largely successful in maintaining low inflation and price stability." Enjoy...




How The Government "Punished" Wall Street, Explained In 1 Cartoon




 







The Economic End Game Explained

by Brandon Smith, Activist Post:
Throughout history, in most cases of economic collapse the societies in question believed they were financially invincible just before their disastrous fall. Rarely does anyone see the edge of the cliff or even the bottom of the abyss before it has swallowed a nation whole. This lack of foresight, however, is not entirely the fault of the public. It is, rather, a consequence caused by the manipulation of the fundamental information available to the public by governments and social gatekeepers.
In the years leading up to the Great Depression, numerous mainstream “experts” and politicians were quick to discount the idea of economic collapse, and most people were more than ready to believe them. Equities markets were, of course, the primary tool used to falsely elicit popular optimism. When markets rose, even in spite of other very negative fiscal indicators, the masses were satisfied.
Read More @ Activist Post


Stock Market, Food, and Electricity Prices Rise to RECORD HIGH

from The Money GPS:





Tuesday, November 11, 2014

If Everything Is Just Fine, Why Are So Many Really Smart People Forecasting Economic Disaster?

by Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse Blog:
The parallels between the false prosperity of 2007 and the false prosperity of 2014 are rather striking.  If we go back and look at the numbers in the fall of 2007, we find that the Dow set an all-time high in October, margin debt on Wall Street had spiked to record levels, the unemployment rate was below 5 percent and Americans were getting ready to spend a record amount of money that Christmas season.  But then the very next year the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression shook the entire planet and everyone wondered why most people never saw it coming.  Well, now a similar pattern is unfolding right before our eyes.  The Dow and the S&P 500 both hit record highs on Monday, margin debt on Wall Street is hovering near record levels, the unemployment rate has ticked down a little bit and Americans are getting ready to spend more than 600 billion dollars this Christmas season.  The truth is that the economy seems pretty stable for the moment, and most people cannot even imagine that an economic collapse is coming.  So why are so many really smart people forecasting economic disaster in the near future?
Read More…


New Plan to End Too Big to Fail Banks Previously Failed Spectacularly

by Pam Martens, Wall Street on Parade:
Apparently, not one of the global regulators pushing the latest plan to prevent another taxpayer bailout of the over-leveraged, globe-trotting banking behemoths that crashed the financial system in 2008 ever worked a day on Wall Street or sat behind a trading terminal during the crisis. If one had, he would have exposed this plan immediately as an exercise in illusory thinking – effectively, the same framework on which global banking currently exists.
Yesterday, the Financial Stability Board, established in 2009 to coordinate financial regulatory proposals on behalf of the Group of 20 major economies (G-20), released a proposal that is being promoted as a means of ending taxpayer bailouts of too-big-to-fail banks. These 30 banks are known as G-SIBs, or Global Systemically Important Banks. But the proposal does nothing to address the “systemic” danger of these banks, thus the proposal is nothing more than captured regulators floating another useless trial balloon for reform because they lack the political courage to admit the only solution is to break up these bloated financial institutions that regularly function variously as crime syndicates and institutionalized wealth transfer systems.
Read More @ WallStreetonParade.com


A Panic Crash, Loss Of Confidence & A Severe Financial Crisis

from KingWorldNews:
On this day in 1918, Pvt Henry Gunther of Baltimore, Maryland thought he saw a suspicious movement in the German trenches across the way. Fearing that the “Huns” were using the mid-morning sun to get some territorial advantage while the peace talks dragged on, Gunther decided to rush the suspicious area. Henry was fast but, unfortunately, not invisible. A single shot from a German rifle struck him in the heart and killed him instantly. The time was 11:01 a.m. just 1 minute after the war officially ended, making Put Henry Gunther the final casualty of World War I.
Thus, he joined nearly 8.4 million other victims who died in that conflict alone (113,000 Americans). But Gunther was in a distinct minority – he died of a wound. More than half of the rest died of the flu or other illnesses. But, as noted, at 11:01 a.m., Harry Gunther became the last military casualty of World War I. If only he had known that world leaders had already agreed upon on a cease-fire (about four days before). But with a nod to symmetry, history and-yes-even numerology, they had decided to implement the Armistice on the Eleventh hour of the Eleventh day of the Eleventh month.
Art Cashin continues @ KingWorldNews.com


QE isn’t Dying, it’s Morphing

from Nomi Prins:
A funny thing happened on the way to the ‘end’ of the multi-trillion dollar bond buying program known as QE – the Fed chronicles. Aside from the shift to a globalization of QE via the European Central Bank (ECB) and Bank of Japan (BOJ) as I wrote about earlier, what lingers in the air of “post-taper” time is an absence of absence. For QE is not over. Instead, in the United States, the process has simply morphed from being predominantly executed by the Federal Reserve (Fed) to being executed by its major private bank members. Fed Chair, Janet Yellen, has failed to point this out in any of her speeches about the labor force, inflation, or inequality.
The financial system has failed and remains a threat to us all. Only cheap money and the artificial inflation of asset values can make it appear temporarily healthy. Yet, the Fed (and the Obama Administration) continue to perpetuate the illusion that making the cost of (printed) money zero by any means has had a positive effect on the population at large, when in fact, all that has occurred is a pass-the-debt-ponzi-scheme co-engineered by the Fed and big US bank beneficiaries. That debt, caught in the crossfires of this central-private bank arrangement, is still doing nothing for American citizens or the broader national or global economy.
Read More @ NomiPrins.com


Former Goldman Banker Reveals The Path To The Next Depression And Stock Market Collapse

by Nomi Prins, NomiPrins.com, via ZeroHedge:
Our political-financial system has gone from the dysfunctional to the failed to the surreal. Speculation, once left to individuals and investors, is now federally sponsored, subsidized and institutionalized. When this sham finally buckles and the next shoe falls and rates do eventually rise, the stock market will tank, liquidity will die, and the broader economy will plunge into a worse Depression than before. We are not there yet because of these coordinated moves and the political force behind them. But we are on a precarious path to that inevitability.
Read More @ ZeroHedge.com


The Most Important Question about Gold and Silver Price Suppression, Answered!

A Change of Plans
from The Wealth Watchman:

I was going to write on a different topic today, but I had someone ask me a question, prompted by an exchange he’d read from a certain guru, Mr. Martin Armstrong.  The exchange was about whether or not gold and silver were being actively suppressed by banks and governments.
Armstrong continues to come against the argument of long-term suppression, but this shield brother’s question is so crucial, that once I read it, I knew I had to write on this topic immediately.  It is becoming more and more important every day, for everyone possible to understand why the manipulation is prosecuted and ongoing, even more than who is doing it or how.
Read More…


Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts – Audacious Oligarchy

from Jesse’s CafĂ© AmĂ©ricain:

“The problem of the last three decades is not the ‘vicissitudes of the marketplace,’ but rather deliberate actions by the government to redistribute income from the rest of us to the one percent. This pattern of government action shows up in all areas of government policy.”
Dean Baker
“Most of them became wealthy by being well connected and crooked. And they are creating a society in which they can commit hugely damaging economic crimes with impunity, and in which only children of the wealthy have the opportunity to become successful. That’s what I have a problem with. And I think most people agree with me.”
Charles Ferguson, Predator Nation
“No lie can live forever.”
Thomas Carlyle
There is a currency war ongoing. It’s objective is the subjugation of whole peoples, including the domestic public. In a very real sense it is nationless.
Read More @ Jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.ca


A Ginormous Financial Shift Underway in the World

by Bill Sardi, Lew Rockwell:
Only for those persons who want or need to understand what is going on in the world financially.
Here is what is happening:
1. The US is involved in a financial war against Syria, Iran and Russia, by reducing the price of oil to below break even. This frees-up billions in the consumer economy.
2. China is buying cheap oil by the boat loads and is switching its primary source from Iran to Nigeria.
3. Japan (read below) is switching from investing US dollars it earns by selling cars and cameras from US Treasury Bonds (which are earning less than 2%) to investing in the stock market. Japan now holds $1.2 trillion of US Treasury bonds that are almost worthless now as they will likely never be repaid. This is a monumental change. Japanese companies have been buying each other’s stocks to prop up prices. This will create a crisis for the US which is living on borrowed money to pay for military, Medicare and Social Security.
Read More @ LewRockwell.com