Economic pressures

[Danny B]

Elastic money supply,,, sliding down

Armstrong excoriates Andrew Jackson for killing the central bank. Armstrong is a speculator. His major blindness is; he demands an elastic currency. Under a gold standard, the currency grows at the same rate as the gold supply. This allows for very little speculation. What he fails to recognise is; any elastic currency will eventually be overstretched by the State and bankers. The original charter of the FED was pretty good. Naturally, the bankers were not happy with this. In general, a State goes off the gold standard when it is preparing to go to war. They need to make war on their credit card. Unfortunately for the R.O.W. America had the huge Bretton Woods credit card.
The elastic currency ALWAYS brings a credit cycle. The state wants that to buy elections and wars. The bankers want that to suck in the punters and fleece them. We are coming to the end of a credit super-cycle. On a gold standard, this could never happen.
After the turn of the century, the bankers ramped up borrowing at the same time that wages were falling. They were bailed out. They have needed a continual bailout.

"taxpayers have written checks totaling $190 billion to Uncle Sam so far this month.

Yet despite being flush with tax revenue, the US government still managed to pile almost a quarter of a trillion dollars more on top of its already enormous mountain of debt."
"the US government spends nearly the ENTIRETY of its tax revenue on Social Security, Medicare, and Interest on the Debt."
The US Government Quietly Added $200 Billion To The National Debt This Month Alone | Zero Hedge

"The model is forecasting NOT a “recession” in the old terms, but an economic decline. This is why taxes keep rising, for they need money to try to retain power. This creates DEFLATION and not the HYPERINFLATION that so many falsely believe is the only way empires, nations, and city-states crumble into the dust of history."
"This is all part of the economic decline that began with 2015.75. Even the poverty rate in Europe, the great socialist economy, has risen to 16% and is still rising. "
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/a...-post-2015-75/

"The economy has had three jobless recoveries following the last three recessions" It will only get worse. Most of this article is plain lies.
https://www.theatlantic.com/business...epared/544391/

[Danny B]

Surviving on a housing bubble

The upper loop meets the lower loop in the housing market. Residential RE is not bought like commercial RE. We buy the biggest house we think that we can afford. We don't think about return on investment. Residential RE is a prime candidate for price inflation because human nature takes over, NOT good business practices.

"Ultra low interest rates mark a shift away from people’s wealth residing in their savings and pension plans, and into to so-called wealth residing in their homes, which are bought with ever growing levels of debt."
"home sales, and bubbles, are the only thing that keeps our economies humming. "
"This is a global issue. Housing bubbles have been blown not only in the Anglosphere, though they are strong there, many other countries have them as well, Scandinavia, Netherlands, even Germany and France. It’s what ultra low rates do."
No mention of China that has the biggest bubble of all because Chinese put all their savings into RE.

"What we have invented to keep big banks afloat for a while longer is ultra low interest rates, NIRP, ZIRP etc. They create the illusion of not only growth, but also of wealth. They make people think a home they couldn’t have dreamt of buying not long ago now fits in their ‘budget’. That is how we get them to sign up for ever bigger mortgages. And those in turn keep our banks from falling over."

"Record low interest rates have become the only way that private banks can create new money, and stay alive"
"Without the ZIRP rates, the mortgages they lure people into, and the housing bubbles this creates, the amount of money circulating in our economies would shrink so much and so fast the whole shebang would fall to bits.

That’s right: the survival of our economies today depends one on one on the existence of housing bubbles. No bubble means no money creation means no functioning economy."
This is a hard-to-believe graph, https://3r8md7174doo44lgpk3kou79-wpe...rice-index.png
"Most new Zealanders can no longer afford property in major centers, and forcing prices down this way will expose many present owners to margin calls and foreclosures.

Moreover, because Australian banks own their New Zealand peers, if the Aussie boom is really gone, these banks are going to get hit so hard they’ll take down New Zealand with them. Close your eyes and put your fingers in your ears."
http://userscontent2.emaze.com/image...897499_fo4.jpg

"Looks like the American housing bubble is back with a vengeance. It’s always amusing to see claims that this is due to a lack of supply. The real problem is not supply, but artificially fabricated demand. Fabricated by low rates. " HOT MONEY
Various cities, https://3r8md7174doo44lgpk3kou79-wpe...t-to-own-1.jpg
"Now remember what I said before: millions upon millions see their savings and pensions melt away before their eyes, while at the same time they are forced to spend ever more on housing costs. And when that scheme hits the wall, the economy will remember it’s alive only because of the housing bubble, and then croak."
"Leaving both renters and owners without jobs and eventually places to live. " There is always FEMA summer camp.
"you have an economy with either a lot of foreclosures and homelessness in its future, or a bankrupt banking system."

"Property in China is all on red. In the US about one quarter of household wealth is in housing, in China it’s three quarters. "
https://www.theautomaticearth.com/20...human-history/

[Danny B]

Too many changes at once

Only 13 percent of people worldwide actually like going to work - The ...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/.../o...de-actually-li... The data, which are based on nationally representative polling samples in 2011 and 2012 from more than 140 countries, show that 63 percent are "not engaged"
With the advent of cheap shipping, effectively, hundreds of millions were added to the global labor force. These hundreds of millions were added to the productive sector, but, only MARGINALLY added to the consumptive sector. At 30 bucks a month, they would eat better but, not much more. The Chinese government added to consumption by printing up mega-tons of new money.
Chinese growth is slowing way down and Chinese debt is growing faster than fast. States and Central banks worldwide are printing up money to maintain employment. BUT, the aggregate population of working age people is falling. The State is trying to extend this number by raising the retirement age. At the same time, automation is taking jobs. There is 70% youth unemployment in Spain.

As aggregate employment and aggregate wages diminish, discretionary spending decreases. To preserve profits and margin, industry utilizes more and more automation. As more automation enters the workplace, the surviving workers need to be more and more skilled to stay ahead of the machines.
"Most" people don't want to work anyway. All of the above has created a huge dislocation in the economy and consequently, in finance. Almost 100 million Americans of working age are not in the labor force. Their productivity has been transferred to low-wage workers. automation chips away at every job market. The State tries to make up the difference.
Essentially, all government is socialist. Given the opportunity, it will print so that nobody is poor. This always has the same end result.
The more automation we have, the more it prints. Public debt is growing faster than exponentially.
Realistically, if GOV just sent a check to everyone, nothing would get done. The CAFR1 site shows that GOV agencies have extracted hundreds of $billions and doesn't need to tax. Presumably, this is to keep all of us poor enough that we get up and go to work. This plan is failing because the robots have squeezed us out.
The PTB have focused on productivity because, historically, productivity was the most important factor. The robot has taken over productivity and now, the State stumbles around trying to re-focus on consumption. At the same time, lack of meaningful employment rots the soul and national fiber.

Our general economy can not re-adjust to these changes. The State is trying to maintain control of it's primary mechanisms. MONEY CREATION AND TAXING. The blockchain and BTC came out of left field and nobody knows where that will lead.
Here is a COMPREHENSIVE article examining many of the relationships between; the State, the economy and, the People.
Deutsche Asks A Stunning Question: "Is This The Beginning Of The End Of Fiat Money?" | Zero Hedge

[Danny B]

Debt service,,tax cut,,BTC

The FED claims that 94.4 million are not in the labor force. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS15000000
11/02 U.S. jobless claims near 44-1/2-year low; productivity accelerates – Reuters
11/02 Child poverty in Britain ‘set to soar to new record’ – Guardian
11/02 House prices up 70% but experts don’t think there’s a bubble – Bloomberg
In other news,
11/02 Bank of England hikes rates for the first time in a decade – CNBC
11/02 New Czech hike to set the pace for EUROPEAN rate rises – Bloomberg
Any Central bank that raises rates will attract capital AWAY from low-interest States. We'll see how that works out.

Armstrong, "The Knights Templar began a banking system because it became too dangerous to travel with money. These people would rob you giving rise to the term “highway robbery”. If you were in London and needed to send money to someone in Rome, you went to the Knights Templar and they would simply send a message and the local branch in Rome would make the payment for you and London took in your payment. This was how international payments began to surface after the Dark Age.

The French king seized the Papacy, moved it to Avignon in France, installed a French Pope who then declared the Knights Templars were devil worshipers and seized all their wealth on Friday the 13th. They were all burned at the stake alive and the king got to keep all the money. This became the Financial Crisis of the 13th-14th Century."
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/i...o-raise-money/

"In 2008 when the national debt stood at $10 trillion, the federal government paid $336 billion in interest. "
"In 2012 when the debt crossed the $16 trillion threshold, the interest payment was almost $456 billion."
"In 2016 with the national debt approaching the $20 trillion mark, the interest payment was $497 billion."
"It is difficult to overlook the fact that 2016’s interest payment was an all-time record at the second lowest rate on the 46-year chart.

* * * If the ten-year Treasury bill were to rise to 2.82% (the average since 2007), the implied interest payment would exceed $750 billion,"
Government Finances and Gold |
ZIRP is for the benefit of the State to service debt with less pain. It doesn't matter if huge sections of the economy wither away,,, as long as the State can afford to service it's debt.

Stockman, "Moreover, the idea that the GOP can pass a "middle class tax cut" is also way off base. That's because the middle class doesn't pay much income tax, and the 75 million households at the bottom half of the distribution pay virtually none at all."
"the built in CBO spending baseline for the next decade is $53 trillion, and even that assumes abnormally low interest rates (relative to inflation) as far as the eye can see.

Yet the budget resolution did not provide for a reconciliation order to the standing committees for one single dime of savings over the next decade. And without reconciliation there will never be any budget reductions because entitlements, mandatories and interest on the soaring public debt comprise 75% of that $53 trillion baseline. That is, if the standing committees are not ordered to make reforms they do nothing, thereby permitting the doomsday machine to just roll on automatically and indefinitely."
"Yet by then, the baseline level of red ink by CBO's lights will be $1.o2 trillion per year or nearly $1.2 trillion with the tax cut add-on permitted under this year's budget resolution."
"In short, the GOP is now in the midst of kicking the fiscal can right straight into a terminal crisis. Indeed, they have as much as admitted that in the implicit numbers in their phony FY 2018 budget resolution, "

"What lies around the corner is an immense fiscal catastrophe. That's the inexorable result of the current cacophony of can-kicking in the Imperial City."
"That is to say, after 100 months of so-called business expansion we still have negative real interest rates."
Contra Corner » The Can Kickers’ Cacophony

BTC news
11/02 Ron Paul to US government: “keep your noses out of bitcoin” – Cryptovest
11/02 Andrew Hoffman – bitcoin to infinity, still? – FSN
11/02 The bitcoin bubble – greater fool theory – Economist
Kaspersky Lab detects virus that steals bitcoin & other cryptocurrencies
I wonder if this virus can steal gold?

[Danny B]

Scraping the bottom of a barrel of fumes,,, with a gun

Revealed: Secret plan to keep Iraq under US control | The Independent
The Independent | News | UK and Worldwide News | Newspaper › News › World › Middle East
Jun 4, 2008 - A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely
Tillerson Says US Occupation Of Iraq IS PERMANENT
"In 2016, the United States exported about 5.2 MMb/d of petroleum to 101 countries. Most of the exports were petroleum products. The resulting net imports (imports minus exports) of petroleum were about 4.9 MMb/d."
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=727&t=6

So, Iran is next to Iraq and a very strong state. US Is #1 Enemy, Iran Will Never Yield To It - Supreme Leader
Pox Americana has pretty much lost control of Syrian oil. Iraqi oil is ever-more important.

What about minerals?
Rare Earth: Afghanistan Sits on $1 Trillion in Minerals - NBC News
Trump's Afghanistan strategy may unlock 3 trillion in natural resources
Pentagon says that U.S. military to be in Afghanistan for 50 years.
Here is an excellent article about America running out of both minerals and oil.
https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/...nning-out-room
"Rio Tinto has reported an inferred resource of 1.624 billion tonnes containing 1.47 percent copper and 0.037 percent molybdenum at depths exceeding 1,300 metres (0.81 mi)."
"Well, with a little conversion of MJ into barrels of oil, we discover that just a little over 5 million barrels of oil would be involved just in lifting the ore to the surface."
America runs a trade deficit of about $ 1.5 billion EVERY day. A default cascade would pretty much bring that to an end. We trade dollars, in the form of treasury bonds for resource imports. We get the resources at the point of a gun. Nobody actually wants our Treasury bonds so, the FED buys them. If interest rates returned to just 3.7%, it would cost $1 trillion a year for debt service. The only way that we can service the debt is for the FED to print up the money to pay interest.

[aljhoa]

"The Knights Templar began a banking system because it became too dangerous to travel with money. These people would rob you giving rise to the term “highway robbery”. If you were in London and needed to send money to someone in Rome, you went to the Knights Templar and they would simply send a message and the local branch in Rome would make the payment for you and London took in your payment. This was how international payments began to surface after the Dark Age.

Useful Idiots


Al

[Danny B]

Venezuela, Sr. Price,,, coin news

The oil majors want to pillage Venezuela. Venezuela is being locked out of the credit markets. Venezuela has just declared that they are going to restructure their debt. They need to sit down with their creditors and come to an agreement. BUT, the sanctions block their creditors from negotiating. This will probably bring on a default. BUT, there are lots of derivatives written against a default.
"Tomorrow Will Be Ugly": Venezuela To Restructure All Debt As Creditors Panic Over Imminent Default | Zero Hedge

A major "coin" is imploding, Another One Of The World's Largest ICOs Is Collapsing | Zero Hedge
China hopes to make a big splash with their One belt--One Road program.
"It connects 65 countries and 4.4 billion people.
In 2016 Chinese companies signed 8,158 contracts in 61 countries worth $150b.
In 2016 China’s trade with the One Belt…One Road countries reached $953b"
The Real ?New World Order? Is Coming To Life | Zero Hedge
They are making BIG bets on overland rail transport, as opposed to ship transport.

Sr. Price has a great article. Computer is acting up so, I won't excerpt it.
http://www.24hgold.com/english/news-...nas+Price&mk=1

Crypto news;
11/03 One bitcoin transaction uses as much energy as your house in a week – Motherboard
11/03 Bitcoin ‘very definition’ of a bubble, Credit Suisse says – Bloomberg
11/03 War on bitcoin? – Economic Times
11/03 Bitcoin is a commodity, not a currency – CNBC
11/03 Japan: a forward thinking bitcoin nation – Forbes
11/03 A silence for altcoins as bitcoin highs slice value across markets – Coin Telegraph
11/03 Big bitcoin exchange just added 100,000 users in a day – GATA

State assistance, http://realinvestmentadvice.com/wp-c...DPI-080717.png
"Importantly, for the average person, these social benefits are critical to their survival as they make up more than 22% of real disposable personal incomes. With 1/5 of incomes dependent on government transfers, it is not surprising that the economy continues to struggle as recycled tax dollars used for consumption purposes have virtually no impact on the overall economy.”
https://realinvestmentadvice.com/the...ate-conundrum/

[Danny B]

No answer for displacement by automation

Man graduated from a hunter-gatherer existence to an agrarian / farming existence. He then graduated from an agrarian existence to a mechanized society. IF man has no niche in the mechanized society, he must revert to an agrarian system for survival. There are 95 million Americans who are not in the labor force. Savings, family and GOV transfer payments are keeping them alive. Most families have little or no savings. GOV debt is growing faster than exponentially.
Total global debt tops 325 pct of GDP as government debt jumps: IIF
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-g...-idUSKBN14O1PQ

Jan 4, 2017 - Global debt levels rose to more than 325 percent of the world's gross domestic product last year as government debt rose sharply,

Global Debt Hits A New Record High Of $217 Trillion; 327% Of GDP ...
403 Forbidden [/B]
State debt can't continue to grow at this rate. 100 million people can not revert to an agrarian system. (U.S. only)

This State debt is purportedly going to be paid back by the next generation. This just isn't going to happen. Birth rates are crashing.
https://econimica.blogspot.com/2017/...is-out-of.html

The warm bodies just are not going to be born.

What about automation? The robots get better every day. Is every displaced worker going to go start a farm?
Feces-for-brains people propose a robot tax. “Right now, the human worker who does, say, $50,000 worth of work in a factory, that income is taxed and you get income tax, social security tax, all those things. If a robot comes in to do the same thing, you’d think that we’d tax the robot at a similar level.”
It is ALL about compensating for lost tax revenues. Those who propose this are UTTER MORONS. What about the lost income stream to the economy? What about the lost consumption? What about the damage to the human spirit from being on the dole for their whole life?

Should Robots Pay Taxes? No - Capitalism Should Change - Forbes
http://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/.....should-change/ I can't access the article. I think I used up my quota of free articles. Unemployed people don't consume. Robots don't consume. How is capitalism supposed .to adjust to a populace that doesn't consume?

A tax on robots might provide revenues to finance retraining schemes for displaced workers. Seriously, people. Retrain for what?
"In his book Rewarding Work, Edmund S Phelps emphasised the fundamental importance of maintaining a “place in society – a calling”. When many people are no longer able to find work to support a family, troubling consequences ensue, and, as Phelps stresses, “the functioning of the entire community may be impaired”.
https://www.theguardian.com/business...ome-inequality

State debt worldwide is growing astronomically. This is done, in the main, to finance consumption for people who have lost their job OR, it is done to maintain employment even though that particular niche is no longer profitable. Japan has the fastest falling birth rate and , Japan has the fastest climbing debt. As robots take more and more jobs, more and more people see that they can not afford to have children. As the labor force shrinks, consumption and profits shrink. More robots are employed to compensate for lower profit margins.

The U.S. uses debt-money and it carries an interest burden. 10,000 people retire every day and add to the debt burden. 95 million NOT in the labor force reduces both production and consumption. The State could pump debt-free money into the lower loop. Currently, it pumps debt money into the upper loop.
U.S. GOV took in $ 180 B in October and borrowed $220B on top.
Eventually, the world is going to discover that it can't support rising debt with a falling population. Eventually, the State will have to support the millions of retirees OR let them die.

[Danny B]

Competing models in banking

The formula in America is for the private banks to do almost all of the credit creation. They rake in $trillions in fees and interest. The bank of North Dakota is an exception.
"Public banking is banking operated in the public interest, through institutions owned by the people through their representative governments."
"Public banking is distinguished from private banking in that its mandate begins with the public's interest. Privately-owned banks, by contrast, have shareholders who generally seek short-term profits as their highest priority. Public banks are able to reduce taxes within their jurisdictions, because their profits are returned to the general fund of the public entity. The costs of public projects undertaken by governmental bodies are also greatly reduced, because public banks do not need to charge interest to themselves. Eliminating interest has been shown to reduce the cost of such projects, on average, by 50%."
"As of the spring of 2010, North Dakota was also the only state sporting a major budget surplus; it had the lowest unemployment and default rates in the country; and it had the most community banks per capita, suggesting that the presence of a state-owned bank has not only not hurt but has helped the local banks."
Introduction to Public Banking - Public Banking Institute
You get the idea. The HUGE interest drain is just returned to the people.
Edit,
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...=1476894381025
Everybody goes on and on about the enormous credit bubble in China.
"In the early 1980s, the government started opening up the banking system and allowed four state owned specialized banks to accept deposits and conduct banking business. These four specialized banks are the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), China Construction Bank (CCB), Bank of China (BOC) and Agricultural Bank of China (ABC).

In 1994, the Chinese government established three more banks, each of which is dedicated to a specific lending purpose. These policymaking banks include the Agricultural Development Bank of China (ADBC), the China Development Bank (CDB) and the Export-Import Bank of China.
Introduction To The Chinese Banking System

50% of the cost of everything in America is for the cost of finance. It runs 19% for trash collection and 78% for public housing. China has built up a huge, impressive infrastructure in an amazingly short time. America has built up a huge, amazing public debt in a short time. Just as the Bank of North Dakota has proved the advantage of public banking, China has done the same. That isn't to say that they won't have some kind of crash. Their banking system is far more likely to survive because it SERVES the economy rather than bleeding it.

[Danny B]

China in on the one-world west plan?

There is a long-running debate as to whether or not the East is in on the "Rothschild" plan for a one-world currency and one-world GOV. Here is an infographic from Armstrong that shows China's place in history.
https://d33wjekvz3zs1a.cloudfront.ne...rldEconomy.jpg
You can see that China fell badly about the same time as the Second opium War. It is a good bet that the Chinese will always do what is best for China.
Labor Protests Multiply in China as Economy Slows, Worrying Leaders ...
https://www.nytimes
China labour unrest spreads to 'new economy' - Financial Times
https://www.ft.
China hopes to have a soft landing when the credit crash hits the world economy. They hope that their gold will bring confidence when credit is impossible to find. They hope to maintain employment and raise the standard of living. They hope to NOT get screwed again by the West.

Brandon Smith, "On the contrary, China and Russia remain, as ever, heavily partnered with the IMF as well as the Bank for International Settlements, and their ties to international banking monoliths like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are long established.

Eastern political and economic officials have consistently called for a new reserve system supplanting the dollar, this is true. But what so many analysts seem to overlook is that they ALSO call for that new system to be dominated by the IMF."
I believe that he is wrong. China needs to pay lip service to Western power structures,,, as long as it doesn’t conflict with their end plan.
"China is more than happy to oblige the globalists with a concerted and incremental program of de-dollerization. But this does not mean that the end-goal is a "petroyuan." No, the goal is for the IMF to assert the dominance of the SDR basket system as a reserve hub."
Not going to happen.
"As I examined in my article 'The Globalist One World Currency Will Look A Lot Like Bitcoin,' while some politicians and banking moguls publicly attack blockchain-based products like Bitcoin or Etherium, in the background they are actually heavily invested in these systems"
This is a good article but, I believe that it comes to the wrong conclusion. The entire East has good reason to maintain the West at a good distance. The West frequently bombed the snot out of the East to control them and keep the drug trade going.
China and Russia are not building up their military with the intention to suffer a tight embrace from the IMF and BIS.

[Danny B]

Inflation, junk bonds, unemployment,, middle class

11/05 Fed’s Kashkari says zero evidence of rise in inflation – Reuters
Here is "zero" evidence, https://seekingalpha.com/article/411...ruth-inflation
Here are a billion more pieces of evidence, USA – The Billion Prices Project

Repost, https://www.wired.com/2017/05/will-p...re-not-robots/
"Who Will Pay for the Future if Not the Robots?" Have you ever seen a robot who carried cash or received a salary?
The CBs pumped in $trillions that the economy just didn't need. Everybody who received this hot money looked for a place to invest it with a good return. Too much money with too small of an economy,,,,, to low money velocity. High-risk debt for dodgy companies is paying just 2% https://dollarcollapse.com/money-bub...an-junk-bonds/

California GOV Jerry Brown told the FEDs to get stuffed. Ca. was going to be a sanctuary city and NO wall. Now, he is asking the FEDs for $7.4 billion, California asks US for $7.4 billion for wildfire rebuilding - LA Times

"The US labor force is rapidly shrinking. Wage growth is non-existent. The vast majority of the American people have no savings and little hope for economic improvement. But none of that matters with the G-3 central banks in charge!"
"The unemployment rate that Drudge blares on behalf of Trump is only at its "lowest since 2000" because October saw an astonishing 968,000 people leave the labor force."
"This leaves the total number of people NOT in the labor force at a record 95,385,000. Then, as ZH notes, "this took place as the number of employed Americans declined by 484,000, however since the unemployment rate denominator dropped more, it translated into an actual decline in the unemployment rate!"
Payroll growth, https://www.tfmetalsreport.com/sites...er_msblsbs.jpg
http://news.goldseek.com/GoldSeek/1509726123.php

"Brett Ryan, an economist at Deutsche Bank told The New York Times on Friday that "With jobless claims at 45-year lows, there's really not a lot left on the sidelines. We're at full employment"
"over the past 17 years, the population not in the labor force swelled by 25 million."
https://www.investors.com/politics/e...mployment-yet/

"Fewer than 22% of tax filers even claim the state and local tax deduction, and the vast majority of these are higher-income families. While 78% of those with incomes above $200,000"
https://www.investors.com/politics/e...-tax-cut-plan/
So, the tax plan benefits those who make over $200k. This article refers to them as "high income"
The Republican house members claim that $ 450k is middle class, http://www.newsweek.com/tax-cuts-rep...s-trump-701094
The rape and pillage of the economy by the bankers has left a bad taste in the mouths of the millennials. They seem to believe that capitalism is the culprit. They have a grand idea for a new system.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/11/03...udy-finds.html

[Danny B]

The Bitcoin steamroller

It seems like I spend a lot of time on BTC but, it is taking the world by storm.
"If bitcoin can be converted into fiat currencies at a lower transaction cost than the fiat-to-fiat conversions made by banks and credit card companies, it's a superior means of exchange."
"The confusion here is the same one that plagues the conventional understanding of the foreign exchange markets: people confuse exchange and convertibility, which are both flows, i.e. transactions."

"As long as the cost of converting one form of "money" into another form of "money" is fast and low-cost (i.e. nearly frictionless), then it no longer matters whether the "money" in question can be used directly in an exchange or not."
" This convertibility is certainly fast in the credit card realm, but it's not frictionless; rather, it's costly, as a hefty fee is skimmed for every transaction paid in one currency and converted to the cardholder's domestic currency.
If bitcoin can be converted into fiat currencies at a lower transaction cost than the fiat-to-fiat conversions made by banks and credit card companies, it's a superior means of exchange."
oftwominds-Charles Hugh Smith: Let's Clear Up One Confusion About Bitcoin

Now, to the comments.
"But Bitcoin isn't suitable to be treated as a currency. It is too volatile. Right now the volatility is up so the Bitcoiners are happy. But even if it doesn't find it's intrinsic value of zero at some point the volitionality will go in both directions. When that starts to happen it will be useless as a currency. The volatility with regard to the Dollar and other currencies will be it's downfall as a means of transaction facilitation."
"The volatility is high because the velocity of BitCoin (as a currency) is very low compared to the volume of speculative transactions."
"I like Bitcoin because it is making more people think about the reality of money."

"What's the interest rate one can earn on those crypto fake-coins anyway"
"You don't earn interest as there's no counter party risk. There's nothing to compensate for - just like physical cash or gold."
"Volatility is a symptom of adoption and divestment. The volatility is "up" because bitcoin is being adopted."
"You underestimate the power of the government and money and control of the banksters. Nothing to stop them from creating their own crypto's, calling them "legal tender" and calling yours counterfeit."
"The people don't like it. They just haven't had a workable alternative until now.
"PMs are not a REAL alternative. Resorting to trading in gold dust you wind up with a nightmare like in Zimbabwe. You can trade cryptos and maintain a modern economy. This is why they will be adopted."

"You don't understand. Government CC are non sense. What they will do is digital currencies that are just a digital token on some government controlled ledger, those will function as electronic cash - different from regular Digital currency which is debt issued by private banks. Now, those electronic tokens will be freely tradable on exchanges over the world - similar to Bitcoin. What it means - it will just make it a lot easier to swap bitcoin for those digital currencies. The authorities will allow easier access to the markets while still maintaining some kind of control. But, this is mostly a huge win for Bitcoin. Basically the governments realized they can't win and look for a way to join in."
"That is not the premise of Bitcoin's value. That is the most bullish case, implying a 2500x run from here. The more reasonable bull case has it acting as reserves, like gold, and thus achieving a 60x run from here. From there, other coins more suitable for trade can take over for day to day transactions, or some new tech that can be applied to Bitcoin will come along and dramatically decrease the transaction cost and speed."

"Bitcoin isn't the blockchain. There are a lot of currencies that make transactions a lot better and faster than Bitcoin. Litecoin and Ripple of instance and Ripple is the least expensive (in terms of transactions costs) and definitely the fastest. It's also very stable. Irritating for investors looking for a return but great for financial organisations looking for a predictable, reliable, fast currency. "
"Really? Check your facts 90 banks are using Ripple blockchain network to settle intl transfers. Japanese banks are even using it for domestic transfers as well because it's faster and cheaper. The IMF is looking into adoption to eliminate SWIFT."
https://www.reddit.com/r/Ripple/comm..._with_the_imf/

"Ripple is the least expensive (in terms of transactions costs) and definitely the fastest. It's also very stable. Irritating for investors looking for a return but great for financial organisations looking for a predictable, reliable, fast currency. "
Let's Clear Up One Confusion About Bitcoin | Zero Hedge

[Danny B]

Growth in debt but, NOTHING else

Stockman, "none of the talking heads on bubblevision even mentioned the staggering loss of 484,000 jobs during the month because they ignore the household survey's job count entirely in favor of the establishment survey number (up 261,000)-"
"In that context, one of the most striking numbers in today's report is that 53.0 million prime age men 25 to 54 years old were employed in October, 2017. As is evident in the chart below, that is down by 1.5 million jobholders since the pre-crisis peak in May 2007 and virtually identical to the number in January 2001.

Stated differently, there has been no gain in employed prime age male workers during the entirety of this century!"
"At the same time, the number of social security recipients at the turn of the century was 45 million and is currently 61 million. But due to the inexorability of baby boom demographics and entitlement laws passed years and decades ago, that number will rise to 83 million by 2027"
"The CBO baseline projects outlays of $24 trillion over the next decade for social security, Medicare and SSI (supplemental security income---mainly for the poor elderly). These expenditures are overwhelmingly driven by the baby boom retirement bow wave, and actually constitute 50% of the $48 trillion baseline for total Federal spending (ex-interest) during the 10-year period."
"Worse still, if you add in veterans benefits and Medicaid----both of which are being driven rapidly higher by the aging-out of the eligible populations----the total cost is nearly $31 trillion over the coming decade or 65% of total Federal spending ex-interest."
"the bill introduced yesterday is the biggest con job in years, and that the House GOP will struggle to avoid a complete implosion"
The Dems imploded,,,why not the GOP?

"the baseline individual income tax revenue over the next decade would be $20.9 trillion----meaning that the GOP's ballyhooed tax bill will raise taxes by $386 billion or 2% on everyone else. "
The article goes on to point out that the only reductions will benefit the very richest. The rich just can't help themselves. They look out for each other.
Contra Corner » Funny Facts Friday

"11) The era of cheap energy is over. If the economy tries to recover, oil prices rise so high that it kills the economy/consumers. If we can't afford high oil prices, then we cannot have growth. (because growth causes unaffordably high oil prices!) And the price at which oil is affordable, ie., $30 to $40 per barrel, kills the oil producers and oil producing countries (and kills oil export country government revenues). The cost of extraction of a "marginal" barrel of oil is much higher now. So, energy production will continue to drop and all the oil and commodity producing countries will remain in recession or depression. What's needed to "save" us is $10 oil for an extended period or a miracle in cheap energy technology."
Gulf Coast Commentary: We're Reaching the End of the Road

So I explained to her that without robust growth and a compounding stream of uninterrupted 7.5% returns, our entitlement systems will implode. They probably will anyway. And lacking the stomach for an honest accounting of this predicament, we prefer to pretend it doesn’t exist.

“Is this humor or sarcasm?” she asked. “Both,” I answered. “Fascinating, anyhow, you then demand that we algorithms produce mathematically impossible returns. So we apply leverage, which makes nearly anything possible, even at valuations that are 99th percentile in all of human history. The more leverage we apply, the more stable your system appears. The flatter your hilltop.
Eric Peters: "The Next Market Cleanse Will Be Sharp, Deep, Fast And Feel Like The End Of The World" | Zero Hedge
“He turned to Tokyo. “70% of Japanese corporates pay no taxes because of the loss-carry-forward from 30yrs ago.” Policy makers never allowed the 1989 collapse to properly cleanse. "

Krugman won a Nobel prize in economics. Krugman has feces-for-brains. Long Term Capital Management had 4 Nobel winning economists on it's board. LTCM crashed and almost took down everything else. The "big brains" at Harvard completely missed the 2008 crash and lost $billions. Various fund managers predicted it but, the big brains knew better.
The economic chairs at various universities are funded by the FED and the banks. Nobody gets published unless they endorse the system that the banks want.
Jim Rogers talks about the huge echo chamber that is modern day WESTERN academia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYIEwvLg1U4&t=319s

[Danny B]

Hussman,,State debt volcano,,Fallout from the Russia probe

"Over time, price/revenue ratios come back in line. Currently, that would require an 83% plunge in tech stocks (recall the 1969-70 tech massacre). If you understand values and market history, you know we’re not joking.
– John P. Hussman, Ph.D., March 7, 2000"
So, he was right in 2000.
"we presently expect the average annual total return of the S&P 500 over the coming 10-12 year horizon to be negative. "
Keep in mind that the oil majors are paying stock dividends with BORROWED money.
"On the subject of profit margins, it’s important to recognize just how dependent elevated profit margins are on maintaining permanently depressed wages and salaries, as a share of GDP"
"Simply put, elevated corporate profit margins are the precise mirror-image of depressed labor compensation. The U.S. corporate sector isn’t profitable because it has become vastly more productive, but rather because the aftermath of employment losses during the global financial crisis allowed the distribution of income to become markedly inequitable."

"Our estimate of prospective long-term returns for a conventional, passive portfolio mix has declined to the lowest level in history."
"Based on the consensus of the most historically-reliable market valuation measures we identify, the U.S. equity market is now at the most offensive level of overvaluation in history, exceeding even the levels observed in 1929 and 2000."
"speculators have chosen to collect themselves into a massive version of what AIG became just before the global financial crisis, aggressively selling downside insurance in the attempt to pocket the option premiums, because they can’t imagine that anything could go wrong with that plan."
"Indeed, by the completion of the current cycle, I expect the S&P 500 to surrender its entire total return, in excess of Treasury bills, all the way back to roughly October 1997;"
"In March 2000, I wrote “Over time, price/revenue ratios come back in line. Currently, that would require an 83% plunge in tech stocks"
https://www.hussmanfunds.com/comment/mmc171106/

So much for the stock market. What about the bond market? Dunno.

The EU rules allow a State to have a limited amount of debt,,, a fixed amount.
11/07 Italy Target2 imbalance hits record €432.5 bln – Mish
11/06 US gross national debt spikes by $640 billion in 8 weeks – 24hGold And WE point fingers at Italy and France.
11/06 China’s shadow banking halts as regulation bites, Moody’s says – Bloomberg The Chinese credit bullet train just hit a putrid brontosaurus.
11/06 David McAlvany – it’s all about confidence – financial survival Network Apparently, he reads Armstrong.
11/06 Dow to lose 97% against gold – Gold Broker We'll see.
11/06 German investors now world’s largest gold buyers – GoldCore Not crypto?

11/07 Why Tesla will keep crashing – Casey Research

"They" cast out a VERY wide net to find dirt on Trump. Funny just how much dirt they are finding.
Boris Johnson Reportedly Linked To FBI Russia Probe
Mueller Has Enough Evidence To Charge Flynn - Report
Paradise Papers - Massive New Leak Exposes
Tax-Haven Secrets, Links Wilbur Ross To Russia
Russia Documents Mean Trouble For Sessions
Paradise Papers - New Offshore Leaks Mention
Queen Elizabeth, Presidents Trump And Putin

Queen Elizabeth Invested In Firm Targeting Mentally Ill
Mueller Probe Expands To Include Podesta Group
Paradise Papers - Queen Invests MIllions Offshore
Predator Firm Preying On UK’s Poorest
Brazile Rats Out Hillary 'Unethical' Diversion Of Money
Judiciary Member Calls For Mueller's Resignation Over The Clinton Uranium One Scandal
Hillary Paid $163k For Fake Trump 'Golden Showers' Dossier
Brazile Feared For Her Life After Seth Rich Murdered
FBI Turns Over 100s Of Pages Of New Hillary Documents
11/06 Paradise Papers: the world elite’s hidden wealth – Guardian
These rats will do ANYTHING to keep us entertained.

Crypto news;
11/03 Cryptoshuffler proves bitcoin owners susceptible to malware – Coin Telegraph
11/07 Saudi Arabia about to confiscate $33bln from 4 of its richest people – Zero Hedge Bet they wish they had crypto and a get-away car.
11/06 Uruguay to launch digital currency, “not bitcoin” it stresses – Bitcoin
11/06 John Tamny – bitcoin junk? – Financial Survival Network
11/06 Bitcoin dominance index surpasses 61% for first time since March – CryptoCoins News
11/06 Bitcoin debate: it’s a bubble! no, it’s not, it cannot be a bubble! – Mish
11/06 Segwit2x: Why bitcoin’s next fork might not mean free money – FinTech
11/06 Bitcoin may change it all: brief history of interest, inflation – Coin Telegraph

[Danny B]

Dirt from Fulford

The 2 items about the Queen having dirty investments AND the Saudi royals getting killed prompted me to look up Benjamin Fulford. I was not disappointed. Here is his take on things.
"There can be no doubt whatsoever that the worldwide purge of the Khazarian mafia now has reached a tipping point of no return, with arrests and purges in the U.S. and Saudi Arabia.

In the Middle East, Iran-linked Hezbollah now effectively rules Lebanon after Saudi puppet Prime Minister Saad Hariri was forced to resign. His resignation was followed by the purge of hundreds of princes, generals, religious leaders, and others by de facto Saudi King Muhammad bin Salman."
"This purge was especially important because it cut off one of the last major remaining sources of Bush/Clinton mafia money and power. Many of the princes purged were homosexually bonded with members of the Bush family and their top lieutenants when they studied in the United States, according to confessions of Kay Griggs, wife of a Skull and Bones Society member, and others. Linked vid.
"This is how Pentagon sources described the unfolding crackdown: “The Saudi purge of the Bush-Clinton pedo terror faction—including [Osama Bin Laden’s brother] Bakr bin Laden and anti-Trumper [Prince] Al-Waleed bin Talal—is timed to the Paradise Papers leak,"

https://www.theguardian.com/news/201...idApp_New_Post
"The start of the purge was timed to coincide with Trump’s visit to Asia so as to be able to more easily protect Trump and his family from retaliatory action, say Pentagon and CIA sources."
"From an Asian perspective, the purge of Prince Al-Waleed is interesting because he is a main actor behind the $100 billion Saudi fund for Korean-Japanese tycoon Masayoshi Son. Son is the guy who bought the Rockefeller-linked Fortress Investment Group. Fortress owns Musashi Engineering, the company that makes the voting machines that steal elections for slave Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his party."
Benjamin Fulford -- November 6th 2017: Purge of Khazarian mobsters intensifies as Trump is kept safe in Asia | Stillness in the Storm