Meltdown

As powerful as the Fed is, it isn’t stronger than the markets. And the longer the Fed tries to sustain abnormalities like QE and 0% interest rates, the more likely it is that the whole business will end with the markets crushing the Fed. At the next sign of a market swoon or of a weakening economy, or with the next episode of deflationary jitters, the Fed will do whatever it takes, no matter what the eventual damage to the dollar’s value. Whatever the details, one thing should be clear. This politburo of unaccountable central planners is the greatest risk to your financial wellbeing today.

With the SEC moving to head off the risk of a bond market meltdown triggered by a dangerous combination of illiquidity and bond fund proliferation, WSJ decided to see which fund providers are the most at risk in a crisis. The list may surprise you...

What can we expect to happen in our homeland when finally even the generally uninformed population also understands that governments they have elected for decades, and its Fed facilitator or controller, jointly have waged a century-long war on its citizens? The people of America cannot make a counter offensive similar to those of sovereign nations; however people are uniting in resistance to robber baron policies, as evidenced by the popularity of nonpoliticians currently in candidacy for the office of president. These troops will mass also, it just remains to be seen what form their eventual counter offensive will be. The established order will be challenged.

"When central bankers start talking like FX strategists, it can signal something important"...

The stock market is rapidly running out of props.

On Thursday, the Fed made it clear that its reaction function has changed. "Data dependency" is gone (or at least relegated to the backburner in times of global turmoil), and international and financial market developments are now officially guiding the FOMC's (tentative) hand. This epochal shift has left market participants asking one very simple question: "Ok, now what?" 

"What scares me, or what worries me, is what the next downturn in the economy looks like, with asset prices where they are and a lesser ability of central banks to ease monetary policy."

In today's centrally planned world, the proliferation of NIRP means that nothing is sacred - not even a Swiss bank account...

With a complex and disaster-prone system of interdependence causing social strife and chaos, why not just simplify everything with a global currency and perhaps even global governance? The elites will squeeze the collapse for all it’s worth if they can, and a Fed rate hike may be exactly what they need to begin the final descent.

The OECD is well aware of the possibility that a Fed hike could plunge emerging markets into chaos. Nevertheless, the time to hike is apprently now...

It seems increasingly likely the next Global Financial Meltdown will arise in the FX/currency markets. The core paradox - that central banks can't control both domestic and global FX markets with the same set of policies - cannot be resolved by printing $1 trillion, or even $5 trillion. Printing money to fix one problem leads to another set of problems that are only made worse by additional money-printing.

This gold coin 2000 years ago buys the same amount of bread today as it did when Jesus Christ was born. That is a real safe haven asset…

The world is becoming increasingly chaotic and the American people are seeking a leader who can bring order, make tough decisions, and capture the zeitgeist of this moment in history. They are in search of a prophet generation (Boomer) Grey Champion, whose arrival marks the moment of darkness, adversity and peril as the Fourth Turning careens towards its climax. The Grey Champion doesn’t necessarily have to be a good person, but they must lead and display tremendous confidence in their cause and path. Franklin, Lincoln, and FDR have many detractors, but during their Fourth Turnings, they most certainly led, casting aside obstacles (sometimes illegally) and enduring dark days and bleak prospects for success. Is there someone of that stature ready to lead the American people now?

48 hours - that's how long it took Citi's chief economist Willem Buiter to issue a report which was just as dire as Daiwa's, but because Citigroup is much more reliant on keeping it traditionally bullish clients as happy as possible, one had to read between the lines to get to the bottom line.  This is Citi's punchline: "A global recession starting in 2016, led by China is now our Global Economics team's main scenario. Uncertainty remains, but the likelihood of a timely and effective policy response seems to be diminishing."