ETC

You don’t actually have any savings. When you make a deposit, you’re trading your money for a banker’s promise to repay you. And there are countless regulations giving them the authority to break that promise. (If you want to test this premise, try withdrawing $25,000 just to see how your bank reacts.) That’s the system that controls your wealth today. It’s almost entirely digital. And it’s run by unelected bureaucrats whose interests are not aligned with your own. This is not a free system. And any rational person should consider parking at least a rainy day fund outside of this system.

These are not problems that can be glibly dismissed with a few well-chosen words, as most politicians are inclined to do. Nor will the 2016 elections do much to alter our present course towards a police state. Indeed, it is doubtful whether the popularity contest for the new occupant of the White House will significantly alter the day-to-day life of the average American greatly at all. Those life-changing decisions are made elsewhere, by nameless, unelected government officials who have turned bureaucracy into a full-time and profitable business.

Did you know that the United Nations intends to have biometric identification cards in the hands of every single man, woman and child on the entire planet by the year 2030?  And did you know that a central database in Geneva, Switzerland will be collecting data from many of these cards?

Sometimes societies just go batshit crazy.

If one looks at the NDX alone, one would have to conclude that the bull market is perfectly intact. The same is true of selected sub-sectors, but more and more sectors or stocks within sectors are waving good-bye to the rally. Even NDX and Nasdaq Composite have begun to diverge of late, underscoring the extreme concentration in big cap names. Naturally, divergences can be “repaired”, and internals can always improve. The reality is however that we have been able to observe weakening internals and negative divergences for a very long time by now, and they sure haven’t improved so far. In terms of probabilities, history suggests that it is more likely that the big caps will eventually succumb as well.

Booms powered by credit, new markets and speculation are followed by busts as night follows day. This creates a very difficult test for every nation-state facing the inevitable bust: how does the leadership deal with the end of the boom? As the world is about to learn once again, the "fix" may make the next bust even more destructive.

China as the global Bubble’s focal point – the weak link yet, at the same time, the key marginal source of Bubble finance. China’s policy course appears to focus on two facets: to stabilize the yuan versus the dollar and to resuscitate Credit expansion. For better than two decades, similar policy courses were followed by myriad EM policymakers in hopes of sustaining financial and economic booms. Many cases ended in abject failure – often spectacularly. Why? Because when officials resort to such measures to sustain faltering Bubbles it generally works to only exacerbate systemic fragilities. For one, late-stage reflationary measures compound Credit system vulnerability while compounding structural impairment to the real economy. Secondly, central bank and banking system Credit-bolstering measures create liquidity that invariably feeds destabilizing “capital” and “hot money” outflows.

The talking heads were busy this week powdering the GDP pig. By averaging up the “disappointing” 1.5% gain for Q3 with the previous quarter they were able to pronounce that the economy is moving forward at an “encouraging” 2% clip. And once we get through this quarter’s big negative inventory adjustment, they insisted, we will be off to the ‘escape velocity’ races. Again. No we won’t! The global economy is in an epochal deflationary swoon and the US economy has already hit stall speed. It is only a matter of months before this long-in-the-tooth 75-month old business expansion will rollover into outright liquidation of excess inventories and hoarded labor. That is otherwise known as a recession.

Time and time again, I’m hearing the same sticking points for failing to prepare – for failing to assure a more promising future for themselves and their families.

Shantytown, Stockton, California, USA

Passports are nothing more than a form of control - a way to obtain oodles of personal information and to restrict one of the most basic freedoms of humanity - the freedom to move. So you can imagine how excited we were when we read about Australia’s government announcing a program to eliminate passports. Great news, right? Well, no...

Those were just excuses, it’s not like any of those factors suddenly changed and were fixed magically on October 1^st.

It's that time again. From 'jolted' Jeb to 'cool' Carly and from 'calm' Carson to 'turmoiling' Trump, for some of the GOP presidential nominee candidates, tonight could be the last hoorah in a campaign that has seen apolitical entrants dominate the mainstream Washington muppets. Moderated by John "I never met a Republican I didn't like" Harwood, we are sure there will be some tension as the "general health of the economy" planned focus may morph into any and everything as the debate pushes beyond two hours. Please watch responsibly...

In order put an end to the "Greek outrage" that Yanis Varoufakis may be doing what Hillary and Bill Clinton have been so good at, namely engaging in a "self-enrichment drive" and profiting from speeches made after his political departure (which in the Clintons' case was merely a tacit way of purchasing influence and future favors, i.e., bribing), and laid out all his public speeches and the associated fees since August 2015.

We live in an era of illusion: the illusion of understanding, and the illusion of control. The net result is nonsensical policies that fail to achieve their stated objectives.