Economic pressures

[Danny B]

Sr. Price.... debt-free money and war

Dream Money; .:Plata:.

The Bretton Woods agreement meant that the various signatories could NOT print domestic currency unless they had dollars as reserves.
The Bretton Woods agreement meant that America could not print dollars unless it had gold to back them.
As their economies grew, the various States had to have more and more dollars to print domestic currency,,, to service their internal economy. They demanded more and more dollars and, sold us stuff to get those dollars.

"In a few words, it turns out that in order for the international monetary system established at BrettonWoods to function, the US is forced to run a permanent trade deficit with the rest of the world. Year after year, the US must purchase more from the rest of the world, than what the US sells to the rest of the world, thus creating a permanent flow of dollars to the rest of the world. This flow makes possible the creation of Monetary Reserves in the Central Banks of the rest of the world."

"Without this constant flow of dollars from the US to the International Reserves of the Central Banks of the world, the currencies issued by those Central Banks would cease to exist. "
"In order to obtain dollars, it is necessary to sell to American customers some product at a lower price than that demanded by an American producer. It is self-evident that there is no other form of introducing an export into US territory, than by means of underselling an American competitor.

This is the reason why a large part of what was once the great American manufacturing industry has disappeared: the overwhelming need of the rest of the world to export to the US, in order to obtain dollars, caused the deindustrialization of the US."
"It is quite unjust to blame the rest of the world for having caused the deindustrialization of the US, and to point an accusing finger at Mexico, for instance, as an enemy of the US because it has been a successful exporter of manufactures to the US. Mexico has simply been operating according to the rules established by the US itself in the Bretton Woods Agreements: the dollar is the world's currency, and at all costs, it is imperative to have dollars in order for Mexico to have a monetary system."
.:Plata:.

"In order to obtain dollars, it is necessary to sell to American customers some product at a lower price than that demanded by an American producer. "
50% of the cost of any item is for financing. 19% for trash collection.... 78% for public housing. The Yuan was too immature and China needed dollars to run it's economy. Since everything in America had a 100% markup, the Chinese could structure their credit system so that they could sell for much less. They also had a much lower labor cost.
The Chinese undercut the American labor costs.
The Chinese undercut the American finance costs.

There has been reams written about how China killed American manufacturing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMlmjXtnIXI&t=199s
But, American manufacturing is much more efficient that Chinese manufacturing. If the Chinese government continues to print whatever money the producing economy needs, they can always undercut our financing costs. This is contingent on them printing debt-free money.

There has been plenty of research on debt-free money, http://www.monetary.org/wp-content/u...per-latest.pdf
American colonial currency was debt-free money, Randy Wray: American Colonial Currency (Debt Free Money, Part 4) | naked capitalism
Japan carries HUGE amounts of GOV debt. As long as it just stays on GOV books, it is essentially debt-free money. Ellen Brown claims that Japan has created debt-free money in a "stealth" manner.

The European bankers have attacked every State that used debt-free money. But, the power of the U.S. military is insufficient to take on the united Eastern front.
After the collapse of the Breton Woods agreement in 1971, the American hegemon made an offer to Saudi Arabia that they couldn't refuse. The petro-dollar was born and dollars were much in demand again. Iran, Russia and China are bypassing the dollar for trade. Pox Americana is rattling sabres at all of them. When the sovereign bond market collapses, the threats of war will ring even-more hollow.

Europe is toast,,, the West is toast. The only way to escape is to JUDICIOUSLY create debt-free money.

[Danny B]

The parasitic costs of finance and speculation

"They" claim that America lost manufacturing jobs because we are paid too much. But, labor's share of the GDP has steadily dropped. Finance's share has steadily grown.
"It may be surprising to note that labor accounts for a relatively small 16% of total manufacturing costs in the US. This moves as high as 30% for certain sectors such as electronics and apparel, to as low as 6-7% for sectors such as Motor Vehicles"
CHART: The Cost Of Manufacturing Stuff - Business Insider
The chart makes NO mention of the cost of finance even though it runs like a poison through everything.

This article has EXCELLENT graphs on the cost of labor but, it is a PDF and I can't extract them.
Hourly compensation costs in U.S. dollars 2011 The cost ranges from $64.15 in Norway to $35.53 in America to $6.48 in Mexico.
The BLS had to do an entirely different comparison for China and India.
2008 $ 1.36 for China and a bit less for India. "average salary nationwide hit 7,665 yuan ($1,111) in the first quarter of 2017"
Wages have risen quite a bit in China because of the one-child policy.

"For India, BLS estimates of compensation costs refer to formal manufacturing only, rather than to total manufacturing in the country. Unorganized sector manufacturing workers account for approximately 80 percent of total manufacturing employment in India and earn substantially less than their formal sector counterparts."

So, the Chinese make 200 bucks a week in a manufacturing job. The American worker makes $ 1421.20.
"Although growth is still strong, China's GDP per worker is only 17% of America's."

China has lower wage costs and lower productivity. America is burdened by huge finance costs making her uncompetitive in many sectors.

[Danny B]

Shrink the debt bubbble.... inverted yield curve

America's lock on the reserve currency has been referred to by the French as, "exorbitant privilege". But, it has also become a trap. The current-account deficit must always grow. Other States must do vendor-financing and hold lots of Treasury bonds. The FED printed up about $27 trillion in the 2008 collapse. A big part of that was needed by European banks to service dollar-denominated debt. Every time that dollar liquidity threatens to shrink, dollar-debt holders get a coronary arrest. The FED may claim that they have stopped QE but, the ESF and PPT are still pumping liquidity into every index and orifice.

The FED also depends on other CBs to pump in liquidity. China has been spectacularly successful.
6/18 US casting nervous eye at China’s ‘phenomenal’ debt levels – SCMP The credit bubble must grow but, there are threats of deflation everywhere. After the collapse of Spanish banks and the extreme haircut to the stockholders and bondholders, EVERYBODY in Europe is nervous about bank debt.
6/18 Fear of contagion feeds the Italian banking crisis – Wolf Street Yep, the Italians are in worse shape than the Spanish. It was called a bail-in but, they don't mention the $5 billion in tax credits that the buyer got.
Fear of Contagion Feeds the Italian Banking Crisis | Wolf Street

Employment never recovered from the 2008 crash, http://media.peakprosperity.com/imag...2017-06-15.jpg
" out-of-pocket costs to purchase a new vehicle have steadliy risen from just over $19,000 in 1997 to over $33,000 today:" The FED graphs show no rise in price at all.
"As of today, credit impulse has gone negative across the world for the first time since the start of the Great Recession.

In Part 2: Everything You Need To Know About The Credit Impulse, we lay out the evidence for why there’s a credit impulse-driven recession on the way. It will come whether or not the underlying economy is recovering or not.

Why? Because the amount of debt creation was absolutely massive across the globe, particularly in China. The excessive debt service will simply overwhelm the economy -- it won't even be a close fight."
https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/...er-all-bubbles

"The yield curve as seen in the picture above continues to flatten out, and this trend will continue until the curve inverts.
The last time the yield curve inverted, the 2008 economic meltdown occurred, and the time before that we suffered the.com bubble meltdown.

The fact is we are existing in a multiple bubble economy at this time, worse, and unlike anything which has ever been seen before.
The reason why these bubbles exist is simple: the Federal Reserve has not allowed the market to do its one and only job, and that is to determine fair value." Fair value is not compatible with crony capitalism and a bloated finance sector.
"What this means is when the yield curve inverts this time, we will experience a meltdown magnitudes greater then the 2008 crash.

The irony is just like last time, the general public has no idea of what is coming and they are just as complacent as well.

In summary.
The federal reserves attempt at raising interest rates is having a paradoxical effect on the market as the yield curve continues to flatten.
I fully expect the yield curve to invert in the not so distant future. What this means is we can expect a market meltdown orders of magnitude worse than the last two times we had a yield curve inversion."
https://steemit.com/money/@marketrep...gory-mannarino

"The defense industry gets rich, instead of that money being spent on whatever the robbed taxpayers were going to spend it on. Any number of industries suffer because our money is stolen and thrown into the trash-pit-of-destruction that is the defense industry.

At least when welfare recipients take our money they only kill themselves if they spend it on cigarettes, alcohol, and crack. The welfare *****s in the military industrial complex spend it on killing others and inflaming international tensions.
What do they care? More war only makes them richer."
Shovel Ready: How The Fed Makes Us Dig Our Own Graves | The Daily Bell

[Danny B]

2 articles

Read these 2 articles and then,,, go plant a garden.
The Automatic Earth; "The Conflicts Forum, directed by former British diplomat and MI6 ‘ranking figure’ Alastair Crooke, sent me another unpublished article by Alastair and asked if the Automatic Earth would publish it. But of course. Previous articles by Alastair published here are: ‘End of Growth’ Sparks Wide Discontent in October 2016, Obstacles to Trump’s ‘Growth’ Plans in November 2016 and What is this ‘Crisis’ of Modernity? in January 2017."
The article puts together David Stockman's original article and then, adds a few other observations.
https://www.theautomaticearth.com/20...-at-the-brink/

The swamp is a reference to the District of Corruption. You can throw in NYC for good measure. The deep State is so insanely removed from the common people that, it is at war with them. Send your money and, SHTFU.

The CBs have killed volatility in the markets in the name of "saving them". They have no appreciation for the danger this brings if any kind of disruption hits.
Deutsche Bank: The Market's Current "Metastability" Will Lead To "Cataclysmic Events" | Zero Hedge

There is something that I see little mention of.
Search; The one hundredth Monkey
Search; quantum tunnelling
Search; Princeton Egg
Our species is in contact at the quantum level. When the bubble is pricked, the contagion and fear will spread faster than believed possible.

[Danny B]

Skynet

Economists DELUDE themselves in claiming that economics is a science. They often refer to "animal spirits" that motivate and modify markets. Is there a sub-discipline of "animal spirits" that seem to be so important to markets?
The economic wonks have reams of paper dedicated to their pet theories and majestic projections. Do they factor in generational cycles? Not a chance. Do they look at prevailing psychology? Not a chance. Their theories posit a MAN who is representative of all men in the population. This MAN has certain habits and preferences. He is the UNIVERSAL MAN pencilled in to all their projections.

Stocks are in nose-bleed territory and employment is in "crying" territory. The wonks assure us that everything is fine. The muppets have a psychological NEED to believe this BS. It saves them the responsibility of having to face reality.

"Disavowing knowledge or responsibility, passing the buck and then changing the subject is the time tested way to live in blissful ignorance. Or as I have grown fond of saying, unconscious incompetence with a heaping side order of willful ignorance. "
"These days over 60% of actual ‘trading’, meaning buying and selling of stocks, bonds and derivatives, is executed by (thinking) machines aka computers."
"Once the AI computer is turned on and the software begins to ‘learn’, no one knows exactly what it is doing or why. And the longer it learns, the more it can and will deviate from its own original programming."
"The easiest way for the machines to make money is to push the market up. But when the tide turns, and it always eventually turns, the machines will shift to making money on the way down with the same speed and zeal they apply to the ‘up’ market.

Only ‘down’ markets tend to breed panic in the humans. When selling really ramps up, market conditions move very rapidly and markets can drop many percentage points in seconds, especially when you have machines making tens of thousands of trades a second and you have thousands of machines all doing this at the same time."
"IF all these (and more) detrimental socioeconomic conditions weren’t present, then MAYBE SkyNet becoming sentient MIGHT be a recoverable event."

"One final thought. The financial crash in 2000-2001 was a loss of confidence in individual companies and/or a sector of companies. That market crash is most remembered as the tech wreck, where technology companies got way over their skies and needed to be rescued or allowed to fail. The banks did the heavy work in bringing the confidence game back from the grave.

But in 2008-2009, the banks themselves got in way over their heads. And this time the Federal Reserve and the US Government, along with every other major global central bank and government, came to the rescue, bailing OUT the too-big-to-fail banks at the expense of the taxpayer. This abomination was later extended to savage the savers with interest rates pegged at near zero in order to guarantee the banks a solid profit.

After all, the bank executives, traders and upper level management must be fairly compensated for all the financial death and destruction they have wrought."
"When the next financial crisis hits, it will be the central banks and governments who will suffer a crisis of confidence. Because this time it will be a currency crisis once everyone realizes the money is backed by nothing more than thin air. And they’ve been printing a LOT of thin air over the last ten years.

So exactly who will come to the rescue of the various global governments? Yup, you and me, that’s who. And we won’t be given any choice in the matter. Suddenly the rapid expansion of the police state makes more sense when seen from this perspective."
"Our money will be confiscated and swapped for bank equity, government bonds or some new type of fake fiat in order to protect us from the disaster they created."
Aside; 6/19 Governments will smash cryptos whenever they want, von Greyerz tells KWN – GATA

"All confidence games are pretty solid right up until confidence is lost. When that happens, the rush of escaping air reaches hurricane force in an instant and all exit doors suddenly slam shut. We peons will be the last to know when the jig is up; therefore there will be no exit for us.

The markets will be shut, the banks closed and all trading ceased before the public is told there is a serious problem. Usually this occurs over the weekend and these institutions simply don’t reopen on Monday. Your money will be frozen in place and completely inaccessible. Sure, the relative small dollar amounts in checking and savings accounts might remain available. But the big chunks will be locked away under ‘capital control’ decrees."
SkyNet is Sentient and Will Destroy Your Investments and Pension | Zero Hedge

[Danny B]

All markets are going to go up forever

"The implausible, the absurd, and the extraordinary can quickly become the norm. Assumingly, this coping mechanism enables us to retain our sanity when events are far from normal."
"The seemingly unabated march upwards in stock prices occurring over the last eight years has had a mind-numbing effect on investors. "
"Investors, actually the entire population, have become mesmerized by the system as altered and put forth by the central bankers. We have somehow become accustomed to believe that debt-enabling low interest rates make even more debt acceptable. Ever higher valuations of assets are justifiable on the false premise of a manufactured and artificial economic construct."

"The more extended the advance, and the higher valuations become, the more stable and promising the investment can appear to be, when judged through the rear-view mirror. That extrapolation was at the root of the tech bubble that ended in 2000, and the mortgage bubble that ended in 2007. It is also at the root of the very mature bubble that has again been established today."
"Muscle memory has taken over and investors do not show the slightest concern for risk. Per Hussman, “investors are accepting this current bull market with increasing dedication.”
"It is difficult to maintain convictions that run counter to most investors and the tape. Animal spirits and the siren song of faulty popular logic effectively draw investors in as events pass “largely outside the scope of conscious choice”. Yet, rationality will prevail as it always has throughout human history "
The Fog Of Markets | Zero Hedge

The FED and various CBs have pumped in many $trillions. The upper loop continues to roll the money into investments. NOBODY will spend the money so, everything just slides down. The velocity of money is on a ski slope.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2V
The crashing velocity negates much of the effect of the runaway currency inflation. It can hardly be called inflation if the CBs create boatloads of new debt.

6/19 Crazy money printing by CBs far from over – Financial Tribune Makes no difference.
6/19 The eternal plea for inflation – Daily Reckoning Upper loop ONLY.
6/19 Liquidity is the liquid of life for the rally – CNBC It sounds better to call it liquidity rather than unpayable debt
6/19 Dow opens at record high as tech stocks bounce – CNBC Do NOT worry. This will go on forever.

[Danny B]

Cross-border liquidity,,, confidence,,oil to stay crashed

The animal-spirits are firmly locked into an oblivious normalcy bias. No matter how extreme conditions become, it is the new normal. The indexes can go screaming up above their historical norms,,,, but, that's OK. Nothing can spook the investors because the FED has their back. They know that the ECB can't stop inflating or,,, the third largest bond market in the world (Italy) will blow within hours. They depend on cross-border liquidity and they believe that China will never cut back.
China is going to look out for China.

I'm writing more about psychology and confidence than about economic factors. The economic factors will decide the day in the end. The FED was trying to "juice" the markets until the economy recovered. A very stupid idea; trying to rescue the lower loop by inflating the upper loop. The graph on velocity is very clear. Nobody is investing in capacity expansion or higher wages.
The FED NEVER intended to print debt-free money BUT, if nobody can pay them back, that is what they get.

"We are facing a major cycle inversion beyond what most people have any concept of how markets trade because all they look at is 1929. Here we can see that the Roaring Bull Market of the 1920s lasted only 97 months. From March of 2009, this present bull market reached 97 months in April."
"This time, retain participation is still near the historic lows since 2007. After 97 months, you expect the bulk of people to be bullish, yet they are bearish. This is more than just a curiosity."
Others do not agree with this claim.?

"This has been the MOST HATED BULL MARKET in history. What is fascinating is how long this current bull market has been in play yet all we hear is how it is going to collapse like 1929 and fall to dust on the floor. I have been asked for interviews because they have been unable to find someone bullish.

We are facing a major cycle inversion beyond what most people have any concept of how markets trade because all they look at is 1929. Here we can see that the Roaring Bull Market of the 1920s lasted only 97 months. From March of 2009, this present bull market reached 97 months in April. This was the time for a pause and we got it. The S&P500 and the NASDAQ soared to new highs when the Dow did not. Yet in 1929 shoeshine boys were trading the market. This time, retain participation is still near the historic lows since 2007. After 97 months, you expect the bulk of people to be bullish, yet they are bearish. This is more than just a curiosity.

We are looking at a future that is astonishing. With the Dow now breaking out to new highs, we are preparing for the cycle inversion and a Phase Transition. We will be issuing a special report in a few weeks covering what will lead to the greatest trading trap of all time.
So buckle up. Get ready for the time of your life. Such opportunities come once in a few generations, not even in a single lifetime."
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/m...et-in-history/
His accuracy has been astonishing. BUT, he has mentioned that if things go past a certain point, it will be a Mad Max free-for-all.

Armstrong's program, Socrates gets all the RSS feeds so, it gets current news. Just the same, I don't believe that Armstrong gives proper weight to birth-control and automation.

So, the whole world depends on cross-border flows of liquidity. Evidently, China pulled the plug.
http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...e%206.12_0.jpg
Weekly commentary: peak stimulus has passed – Credit Bubble Bulletin
6/20 China yield curve slumps to record inversion despite liquidity injection – Zero Hedge
6/20 El-Erian warns “the Fed no longer has your back” – Zero Hedge
Maintaining the bubble gets harder every day.

"The Fed drives bond prices up by purchasing bonds, and the Fed raises interest rates by selling bonds, or by purchasing fewer of them than previously.

I told RT that a real increase in interest rates would undercut the Fed’s policy of rescuing the balance sheets of the big banks whose balance sheets were loaded up with bad debt that desperately needed a rise in debt prices for the banks to remain solvent. "
"RT did not understand that real interest rates had not increased. Indeed, two days after the “rate increase” the nominal interest rate had not changed. It was still 18 basis points. "
" By the time the Fed raised the nominal rate, the real rate was already more negative. Thus, there was no rise in real interest rates."
"Despite this publicized “rise” of the Fed funds rate, the 10-year interest rate on Treasuries “has declined 30 basis points this year. Thus for certain borrowers, the Fed has effectively lowered the cost of borrowing.”
"Why is the Fed raising short rates when the long rates are falling?

Why do “democratic Western democracies” have central banks that do nothing except protect big banks at the expense of the people?"
Democracy Is A Front For Central Bank Rule - PaulCraigRoberts.org
This is about the inversion of the yield curve,,, no matter what the FED claims about raising rates, https://steemit.com/money/@marketrep...gory-mannarino

The credit impulse, Why The (Collapsing) Global Credit Impulse Is All That Matters: Citi Explains | Zero Hedge
OPEC has suddenly come to the conclusion that their customers just aren't buying enough oil, http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-0...g-warning-opec
6/20 Oil tanker storage hits a 2017 record despite OPEC’s cuts – Bloomberg
6/20 Oil slips to seven-month low on signs global glut will persist – Bloomberg
Saudi Arabia needs about $105 a Bbl. to keep their social programs going. It's under $50.

"The net effect of all this sound and fury is a government so paralyzed that it can’t even pass bad legislation or execute its existing (excessive) duties. That might theoretically be a good thing, except what we’re seeing are individual departments just veering off on their own, especially the military, which now operates without any civilian control. Apparently General Mattis, the Secretary of Defense, pretty much decided on his own to dispatch another 8,000 US troops to Afghanistan to move things along there in the war’s 16th year."
"With the US military gone rogue in foreign lands, and the intelligence community off-the-reservation at home, and the Trump White House all gummed up in the tarbaby of RussiaGate, and the House and Senate lost in the shuffle, you also have to wonder what anybody is going to do about the imminent technical bankruptcy of the USA as the Treasury Department spends down its dwindling fund of remaining cash money to pay ongoing expenses "

"That well is going dry in the middle of the summer, and without any resolution to the debt ceiling debate, the country will not be able to borrow more to pretend that it’s solvent.

I don’t see any indication that the House and Senate will be able to bluster their way through this. Instead, the situation will compel extraordinary new acts of financial fraud via the central banks and its cadre of Too-Big-To-Fail associates. In the event, the likely outcome will be a spectacular fall in the value of the US dollar, and perhaps consecutively, the collapse of the equity and real estate markets.

The public may not give a $hit about Syria, Afghanistan, or federal dairy supports, but they’ll sure perk up and notice that their money is going worthless."
http://kunstler.com/cluster****-nation/7816/

Suppose that the FED GOV does shut down in default mode. How are the people going to react?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-0...dont-join-club

[Danny B]

Changing Geo-politics,,, the economic results

Social systems/social problems have a big effect on the economic situation. Global economic systems have a much bigger effect. The Anglo-American hegemon can see that the rest of the world has grown up quite a bit in power. The power is the only thing that interests London, the District of Corruption and the NYC bankers.
The Mother Country claims that Syria does not exist so, they can just take it over. It has LOTS of oil.
Another Israeli Land Grab in Syria

The Western PTB are in the process of putting the entire West under draconian State control. MOSSAD brought us the Patriot Act. AND,
Macron Hopes to Put France in a ‘Permanent State of Emergency’
Operation Temperer: "The UK Will Be Under Martial Law In A Year's Time"
Crisis On The Horizon: Will It Be Economic Collapse? Global Civil Unrest? War? We Won't Have To Guess Much Longer...
The West is fast going down the road to totalitarianism.

The East is trying to shift to cooperation rather than draconian subjugation. I'll excerpt this article but, you really should read the whole thing.

"So now the SCO not only qualifies as the largest political organization – by area and population – in the world; it also unites four nuclear powers. The G-7 is irrelevant, as the latest summit in Taormina made it clear."
"Chinese President Xi Jinping qualifies, in a subdued manner, as “a new type of international relations featuring win-win cooperation.”
As opposed to the Anglo-American OS of complete domination.
"Make no mistake; there will be SCO action in Afghanistan. And that will include bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table"
Trump To Send 5,000 More Troops To Afghan To Die

"Things are moving incredibly fast – on all fronts. At a recent “Future of Asia” conference in Tokyo, the supposedly rabid anti-Chinese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced, although subject to many conditions, that Japan is ready to cooperate with BRI, with its “potential to connect East and West as well as the diverse regions found in between.” A possible China-Japan reset would add the definitive momentum to the BRI, EEU and SCO interpenetration.

Crucially, both China and Russia are also on the same page in terms of fast-tracking Iran’s admission as a full SCO member.
Now compare it with US Secretary of State “T.Rex” Tillerson calling for regime change in Iran."

"Beijing already understood the ultra high stakes ramifications via its relationship with Qatar – a key natural gas provider sooner or later to accept payment for energy in yuan.

Qatar’s quiet pivot towards Iran – the key reason that drove the cornered House of Saud absolutely bonkers – revolves around the common exploitation of the largest gas field in the world, North Dome/South Pars, which they share in the Persian Gulf."
"That would revolutionize the entire energy equation in Southwest Asia; and a key casualty might be petrodollar hegemony, to which Saudi Arabia and the UAE duly abide.

Imagine Qatar/Iran selling their future Europe-bound gas in euros, not in US dollars, just like the Chinese will adamantly move to pay Qatar – and Saudi Arabia – in yuan for their energy supplies."
"And yet Moscow and Beijing – as well as Tehran – are fully aware how these setbacks will only exacerbate the Exceptionalistan environment, a.k.a. the swamp, a.k.a. the deep state, to double down, and continue to provoke havoc."
So, America shoots down a Syrian air force plane to try to get an engagement with Russia. That didn't do it and Pox Americana was sternly warned. Pox Americana replied by shooting down a Russian Drone. What will they shoot down next? Iran, for their part have some real good missiles and don't need to bring planes into Syrian air space.
"because a totally destabilized Syria would be perfect to destabilize Russia from the Caucasus to Central Asia; Russian intelligence has always been focused on those 900 km from Aleppo to Grozny."
Russia is surrounded by bases and they can plainly see what comes next. China can easily see what comes next after Russia is eaten up.

"To compound it, the Pentagon will refuse to abandon Afghanistan – a bridgehead to wreaking havoc in Central Asia. What could possibly go wrong? After all, Daesh is now virtually positioned in Central Asia, not far from Xinjiang and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) – a key node of BRI. "
https://sputniknews.com/columnists/2...rasia-cooking/

England went broke trying to maintain it's empire while the empire was growing in domestic power. England handed off the baton of Power to America while keeping a lot of hidden control. Our Bretton Woods credit card was used to maintain our far-flung empire. The credit card has been maxed-out but, the Western bankers and CBs are trying to squeeze out enough economic growth to get the war kicked off. The resulting grinding domestic poverty would be held in check by our well-developed police State.

Russia and Iran can stall for time by using missiles rather than planes to control ISIS. The neocons are frothing at the mouth in their hatred of Trump. They will let this hatred blind them when it comes to cooperation on the debt ceiling and budget.
We have given the world great cause to unite against us. The warnings of General Eisenhower went unheeded. The endless wars brought endemic corruption to every sector of governance.
The baton of empire will soon slip from our very dirty hands. It will be taken up by the East. They offer peace and cooperation rather than subjugation. The new-world-order will be built on cooperation, rather than on gun-boat diplomacy.
EVERYBODY can smell the changes that are on the wind. Even our close neighbors, https://sputniknews.com/world/201705...ers-agreement/

[Danny B]

Recession predictors

It is said that all money is debt-money and that; if all loans were paid off , there would be no money left in circulation. Triffin's Dilemma" states that bad money chases good money into hiding. A dollar in hand is always better than a dollar in the bank. A dollar is an unregistered bearer bond. All other monetary instruments are registered. All transactions are recorded. 50% of all transactions are in cash, by number., not value.
Naturally, the State does not like cash. In a debt collapse, paper money will be the only thing standing.
Russia is trying to facilitate the use of cash, https://sputniknews.com/science/2017...berbank-drone/

Obummer got the FED to crank up the money machines so that he could look successful. There always seems to be a hangover after a 2 term (faux) president.
"Crunching 107 years worth of data, he showed the U.S. economy enters or is in a recession every time a two-term president vacates the throne:"
"Since 1910, the U.S. economy is either in recession or enters a recession within 12 months in every single instance at the end of a two-term presidency… effecting a 100% chance of recession for the new president."
"Maybe it takes two terms for presidential mischief to work its way into the economic machinery.
One-term presidents just can’t heave enough sand in the gears."

"over the past five decades, each time commercial and industrial loan balances at U.S. banks shrank or stalled… a recession was either already in progress or would start soon. There has been no exception since the 1960s. Last time this happened was during the financial crisis."
"Overall though, Malinen says the relationship between negative credit flows and recessions holds true since 1948."
https://dailyreckoning.com/100-chanc...thin-7-months/

6/21 America is now a ‘second tier’ country – Bloomberg
6/21 We are inches from a new World War, and Clintonists are to blame – Medium
6/21 US seems keener to strike at Syria’s Assad than to destroy ISIS – Independent
6/21 Why is US ‘taking military actions that benefit ISIS?’ – WND
6/22 Oil drops to 10-month low; biggest first-half slide in 20 years – Reuters
That will just drive the financials down even lower.

[Danny B]

Falling oil,, rising debt,,, Armstrong movie

6/22 Oil drops to 10-month low; biggest first-half slide in 20 years – Reuters
That will just drive the financials down even lower. Things certainly are moving fast.
Oil is down 16% from it's price of just a month ago. Fracking was fired up by accessing the junk-bond market. The oil majors recently spent 86% of their profits to service debt. Russia and Iran have cut back a little but, not enough. There is just too much oil for the diminishing demand. When the oil producers lost margin, they pumped like crazy to make up the difference on volume. The debt <15%> is still growing but, prices are falling.
Warning: the Oil Crash Is Just Days Away From Triggering a Debt Crisis | Zero Hedge

I expect the carbon industry to go through a bankruptcy and restructuring. While the neocons would like to blow Iran to kingdom come to take their oil off the market, I don't think it will happen. Iran WILL destroy both Saudi and israel. Attacking Russia would rate as EXTRA-STUPID. The hildebeest wanted that, so, you know that it is both bad and stupid.
Russia proved very well that their new jamming system can stop ALL electronics.
Here is some propaganda vids from youtube,
Russia boasts it can WIPE OUT entire US Navy with 'electronic bomb' as war fears grow - DAILY NEWS
US unveil 'devastating' SUPER WEAPON that ‘nothing can survive’ to smash Russian

"If it were not for the “meddling” in the 2000 Russian election blackmailing Yeltsin not to run and install Berezovsky as President to control the natural resources of Russia, Putin would never be in charge to begin with today. Berezovsky fled to Britain where he supposedly hung himself "

There was a movie made about the life of Martin Armstrong. He got effed REAL bad by the banks. The movie could not be shown in America. Evidently, there is a LOT of interest in the subject. They are now making a much bigger production.
" All I know is they are doing private funding. Most movies go to the banks for funding. For obvious reasons, that will not be the case here."
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/i...sian-election/

The country is essentially run by the N.Y. FED office and the big private bankers. Armstrong was beating the pants off the N.Y. bankers and they tried to destroy him.
Armstrong has now divulged and licensed Socrates. He had $ 3 trillion under management when the banks sent him to jail. If "everybody" had access to Socrates, it would be impossible for the bankers to screw the muppets. It wouldn't be long before all investing was done for rational reasons. It would be impossible to blow a bubble.

As far as I'm concerned, the liberal-world-order is just re-painted socialism. There is worry that it is coming to an end.
Schaeuble Warns US Pullback Could "End Our Liberal World Order" | Zero Hedge
"A federal budget would help benefit the euro-area’s weakest economies, like Greece, Portugal and Italy" Yep, that is the debt-union that the Marxists want So bad.

All that free-money had to flow somewhere. Much of it flowed into residential RE. Home ownership has crashed and people are very unhappy. Albert Edwards thinks that these people are going to eventually hang the central bankers.
Albert Edwards: "Citizens Will Soon Turn Their Rage Towards Central Bankers" | Zero Hedge

[Danny B]

Bogus pension plans,,, Stockman and the worthless stock market

The pension funds continually depend on returns as high as 25% for their payment tables to work correctly.
"Moreover, given that total unfunded public pension liabilities are roughly $5 trillion in aggregate, this implies that a simple 5% drop in assets in 2018 could trigger a devastating ~$3 trillion increase in net liabilities.

Meanwhile, Moody's found that even if the funds return 19% over the next three years then net liabilities would still increase by 15%. "

In its report, Moody's ran a sample of 56 plans with $778 billion in aggregate reported net pension liabilities through three different investment return scenarios. Due to reporting lags, most 2019 pension results appear in governments' 2020 financial reporting, Moody's noted. The plans had $1.977 trillion in assets.
Under the first scenario with a cumulative investment return of 25% for 2017-'19, aggregate net pension liabilities for the 56 plans fell by just 1%. Under the second scenario with a cumulative investment return of 19% for 2017-2019, net pension liabilities rose by 15%. Under the third scenario with a 7.2% return in 2017, -5% return in 2018 and zero return in 2019, net pension liabilities rose by 59%.
In 2016, the 56 plans returned roughly 1% on average "

",,,and we have another big correction in 2018. Such a correction would force the fund to liquidate over $1.5 billion in assets in 2018 alone...."
"....and the system would run out of cash completely within 4 years."
Moody's: Modest Downside Could Spark $3 Trillion Surge In Pension Liabilities | Zero Hedge

Oil is looking worse every day, Gartman: 'Oil Heading Egregiously Lower'; Saudi Oil Reserves Will Be 'Worthless' | Zero Hedge

“The change of change is now negative,” said the CIO.
“The last time we had a major shift in the change of change was a year ago.” In Jan/Feb 2016, China was imploding. Commodity prices were tanking with equity markets, the dollar soared alongside volatility. Then China unleashed explosive credit stimulus, while the Fed blinked, guiding forward interest rates dramatically lower.
Within a short time, the change of change turned positive. "
"China and oil prices,” he said. “Literally, that’s it.”
China’s stimulus-induced rebound and the oil price recovery is all that mattered. " About those oil prices???
Apparently, we've reached the peak of the economic roller-coaster.
Eric Peters Calls it: "The Change Of Change Is Now Negative" | Zero Hedge

Armstrong, "They did that with interest rates. Higher rates means the stock market will decline. Oops. The Fed just raised rates and the Dow made a new high. Interesting! See it is the carrot paradox. Focusing on just one relationship blinds you to the complexity of the whole. Global Warming is the same as the carrot paradox."
"In economics, we had the Quantity of Money Theory that has driven central banks into Quantitative Easing expecting inflation and after 10 years of desperately trying to stimulate inflation, they have been beaten to a pulp by deflation. As always, they make a false simple assumption at the outset which then leads to the false result."
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/w...in-all-fields/

Ho Hum, manufacturing is collapsing. It must have something to do with our lack of income.
http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/defau...0623_pmi_0.jpg
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-0...apse-hard-data

"David Stockman began “we’re in the midst of the biggest political train wreck in modern history… There will be no governance in Washington. There will be no tax bill, stimulus or infrastructure.”

“We’re heading for an expiration of the debt ceiling and running out of cash that will create an enormous crisis by August or September. They’re not going to be able to cope with it.”
Armstrong, "will lead to the greatest trading trap of all time."
Stockman “The market today is trading at 25 times S&P 500 earnings which were $100 a share in the period ending in March. That represents a tiny growth from $85 a share back in June 2007 – ten years ago. We’re about 1.2% over the last decade.”

“Why would you pay 25 times earnings for one percent growth after a tepid expansion of 100 months that’s near the end of its “sell by date?”
https://dailyreckoning.com/stockman-...-storm-stocks/
Let's hope that the muppets don't read Stockman and or MANY others.

6/23 America divided: ‘Summer of Rage’ accelerates – Stockboard Asset Stay tuned for the big half-time show.
6/23 Credit-card debt slaves move to top of Fed’s bank worries – Wolf Street
6/23 Americans are dying with an average of $61,500 in debt – Zero Hedge If everybody died, that would screw the banks real good.

[Danny B]

Crypto-currencies examined

There is a lot of "wildcat" action in the crypto-currencies. I found a good article but, the comments are even better.
"Digitalization has the potential to provide financial benefits to the economy, with the risk, however, of disintermediating central banks."
"Dr. Weidman dismisses the notion that privately issued digital currencies may eliminate central bank currencies, reasoning that “central banks are better able to deliver price stability than a rigid monetary rule or an algorithm.”
Price stability, my culo!
"Dr. Weidman notes that in times of crisis, money holders would withdraw their bank deposits and transfer them into the official digital currency, thereby rapidly withdrawing liquidity from the private banking sector in a digital bank run."

Comments;
I dunno, i think most countries would love to go cashless for ultimate control and Cryptos get them there. They may well co-opt the industry.
As far as I'm concerned, the whole argument regarding CB's creating crypto's to regain control is a non starter. They'll be priced in USDS, GBP, JPY & EUR and the ability to expand the base will always be there. So nothing will be solved compared to the limits in place for the capacity to generate more BTC, ETH, etc. So non CB crypto's will always hold their value complared to the CB's.

Of course, additional non CB crypto's can be created (ie.Litecoin and more) so that is an expansion of the non CB crypto base which may eventually dampen the price of these crypto's overall.

The actual plan may be that CB's unofficially create new crypto's masquerading as uncontrolled, thus fooling the public into thinking that they are just like all the others. Then they can expand the base at will without public awareness. They may already have done so but we'll be the last to know.

They require deposits, they 'want' deposits... otherwise they have no control. Cryptocurrency is ending their control, and it will work, because their foundation is made of sand. The sand storm is coming!

This new decentralized blockchain internet is amazing...innovation is changing the game!
Blockstack: A New Decentralized Blockchain Internet That Brings Privacy & Property Rights to Cyberspace UnifyEvolution.info...
Various western central banks have desired a digital crypto currency for a while now. I would not be surprised if "Bit-coin" is actually a test pilot program sponsored by the Federal Reserve.
How Central Banks Intend To Fight CryptoCurrencies | Zero Hedge

6/23 Coming soon: the great bitcoin crash? – Daily Reckoning
6/23 Legal implications surrounding bitcoin – Legal Solutions
6/23 The bitcoin bubble will turn into mania before it bursts – Forbes
6/23 Cryptocurrency bubble will burst even if coins change finance – Bloomberg
6/23 The curious case of the missing Mt. Gox bitcoin fortune – Cyber Scoop
I believe that the bankers will kill anything that offers competition.

[Danny B]

Fracking and the supply-demand balance..

6/18 Fear of contagion feeds the Italian banking crisis – Wolf Street
6/23 Two Italian Zombie Banks Toppled Friday Night | Wolf Street
Every bank that closes scares off investors and depositors.

Fracking now fuels half of U.S. oil output - Mar. 24, 2016 - CNN Money
"Fracking "has allowed the United States to increase its oil production faster than at any time in its history,"
"But OPEC members may relax their cuts in the second half, for fear of losing market share to U.S. shale oil producers "
http://asia.nikkei.com/Markets/Commo...-against-shale
"Saudi Arabia, the most influential of OPEC's 12 member countries, needs oil at $106 a barrel in order to break even after the costs of its generous welfare programs and energy subsidies. Oil has been around $45 a barrel, and futures contracts don't put it much higher over the next few years. "
This site shows the break-even price for the top 14 producers, starting with Lybia at $144. https://knoema.com/vyronoe/cost-of-o...ion-by-country

"Hundreds of banks were forced to shut down in Texas when the state fell into a recession in 1986 during a steep decline in oil prices. That 1980s meltdown mirrors the current drop in prices that carried oil below $45 a barrel this week. "
Falling oil's next victim: banks - Jan. 16, 2015

Automation is still making steep cuts in employment, http://www.mybudget360.com/wp-conten...US-768x392.png
http://www.mybudget360.com/asset-bub...hing-top-jobs/

"Italy, the eurozone’s third-largest economy, has a sovereign debt-to-GDP ratio in excess of 130 percent and a banking system with a non-performing loan ratio of 18 percent. "
https://www.aei.org/publication/has-...traightjacket/

Liu claims that China will have to sell off a few $trillion in State-owned assets to raise cash.
"assuming state ownership were to be sold down to between 40% and 50% in exchange for fresh funds needed for debt repayment.
"More than half of the funds could be supplied by China's own savings. The remaining [funding] probably will have to rely on foreign investors," said Liu,
http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Econ...ion-asset-sale
ALL these analysts and writers make the explicit assumption that China will NOT just print the money to keep things going. They HAVE to borrow it, preferably from foreign bankers. With the new platforms like the SCO and AIIB, China can tell the West to get stuffed. The East will close ranks behind China and the western bankers can't do anything about it. China can get all the fresh funds that it wants.

Japan shows the way. The CB there is holding paper equal to 93% of the GDP. They can just ignore the numbers because the debt isn't held by outside bankers.
http://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Econ...panese-economy

[Danny B]

reducing the money supply,,, Financialized medical industry

Everybody is hemming and hawing about the FED and the interest rate. While they are all focused on the interest rate, the FED is planning to bring a crashing reduction in the money supply.
This longish article from Jim Rickards explains about bond buying from the FED. It is well worth reading to see the mechanics of how the FED creates money from thin air. The focal point of the article is; the FED isn't going to buy new bonds. They will let existing bonds run to maturity and they will simply throw them into the pixelated trash can. The FED created the bonds to stimulate the economy. They claim that vaporizing these bonds will not de-stimulate the economy.
The economy needs ever-increasing amounts of money to service the ever-increasing debt bubble. ALL the Central Banks have turned down the money spigot. As Armstrong pointed out, the quantity of money theory is just bogus, junk science.

The U.S. Treasury sends over treasury bonds to be monetized by the FED. The FED is not buying. What happens when the debt ceiling fight requires much more debt?

"Global markets have now moved into (what I believe is) the final, parabolic, public-entrapping vertical ascent that typically punctuate established trends with cataclysmic reversals. The problem I have with making such a bold statement is that the body bags are lined up at the side of the road with those that have fought this move firstly since the 2008 Meltdown and then after the 2016 U.S. elections."
One Massive, Global, Serial Bubble | Silver Doctors
Economica goes into greater detail to show that the economy can never grow while it has a falling population.
https://econimica.blogspot.com/2017/...orph-into.html

Financialization is the process where big-money insinuates itself between the producer / service provider AND the final consumer.
"At the beginning of the 20th century health care was one-quarter of one percent (.25 percent) of the economy.
"They’re pretending to attempt to fix a racket that comprises eight percent of the American economy"
Rain Dance - Kunstler

The new rage on the net is; predicting how the current Rage & Hate will morph into the next civil war.
Articles: Bleeding America?
The War of Northern Aggression (U.S. Civil war), was precipitated by the bankers who wanted control of the natural resources of the South. This was complicated by the demands of the Federal government over States rights. South Carolina seceded and demanded that the FEDs abandon Ft. Sumter. Lincoln refused and the war started in North Carolina.
Lincoln Provoked the War
Federal government desperately needed the income from tariffs on Southern goods. South Carolina was well within their States rights.

The division today is between urban centers and the rest of the country. There could be no such thing as a war between urban centers and the agricultural hinterland. Any drastic action taken by the urban centers would immediately cut off their supply lines. We will definitely have civil insurrection but, not a civil war.

Edit As I said, civil war is a hot topic now. Some propaganda.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIWbKjQCq2A&t=32s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zreDmD6FkaE&t=4s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCVEN2ktYPA&t=2s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHjyofxi5jI&t=3s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6arXUJGMlI&t=5s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4HIsACsQhM&t=3s

[Danny B]

Capital surplus

Every time that a Bank failed, the taxpayer was screwed for the funds to bail them out. Heaven forbid that the investors should have to pay. This got the taxpayers quite riled up and the law was changed. There would be a "bail in" rather than a bail out.
2 Italian banks recently failed and the bail-in mechanism was enlisted to wind down the failed banks. The purported bail-in took everything from the holders of common stocks and bonds. BUT, the senior bondholders came out OK. $11.1 billion was laid on the backs of the taxpayers instead.
"The government wants to avoid a political backlash and the risk of contagion spreading across the system."
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/artic...dying-in-italy

Trump, "he doesn’t understand the complexities involved in the balance of payments theory, which has long been discredited as an old mercantilist doctrine. He uses it to attempt to define who the winners and losers are in trade. But, Ed points out, the accounts are always in balance; the other side of a “trade deficit” is a “capital surplus.”

When enough money is put into American goods and services - and when people who trade with Americans also store their money in the US - the US can develop a “capital surplus.” As Ed explains, a country can have a trade deficit because its capital markets are attractive. It is after all trading financial claims for goods and services."
https://dollarvigilante.com/blog/201...us-dollar.html
if all the capital surplus flows into gold and crypto-currencies, there is far less for the bankers to steal.

"And you just know people like the Chinese and Russians would love nothing more than to see the Petro-dollar taken out and replaced. Is our US dollar going to retain its Petro-dollar status over time here, Jim?

Jim Rickards: I don't think so.
Number one, the Chinese and the Russians are really dumb. Or, they see something that you don't. They see something that most people don't see coming. I've spent time in Russia and China, they're not dumb, meaning they see something that most people don't see. And they're preparing for a post dollar world or a world in which the confidence in the dollar is greatly eroded.

How is that actually done? Is it through these MT forms on Swift MT stands for message traffic?

That's how we make irrevocable transfers. Well the United States has a choke hold on all that. We definitely have a choke hold on Fed-wire, which is the dollar payment system. And through our allies and out intelligence services, we have a choke hold on Swift, which is the international payment system.

The last time it was the central banks bailing out Wall Street and really bailing out the world,
Why is the Fed reducing their balance sheet? Why do they care? Why not just keep the 4.5 trillion? What's the big deal? Well the answer is they're at the outer limit of a confidence boundary."
Jim Rickards Exclusive: Dollar May Become "Local Currency Of The U.S." Only | Markets | Minyanville's Wall Street

" After disregarding repeated market warnings, the fragility of such a financial regime became obvious in 2008. Rather than using the crisis and its lessons to reposition to a more well-grounded monetary regime, the Fed and other central banks doubled down. Reflating securities markets became priority one, and central banks went so far as to be willing to inject newly created “money” directly into the markets to achieve their objective.
What objective?

The FED needs to support all the bankers, beggars and bureaucrats.