Steve Bull's Blog, page 1241
December 2, 2017
THE BLIND CONSPIRACY: The Gold Market Is Heading Towards A Big Fundamental Change
The gold market is heading towards a big fundamental change that few are prepared. While many analysts in the alternative media community suggest that the gold price is manipulated due to Fed and Central bank intervention, there is another more obscure rationale that is the likely culprit. I call it, “The Blind Conspiracy.”
But, before I get into the details of this Blind Conspiracy, there are a few very troubling developments in the alternative media community that I would like to discuss first. The bulk of these concerns has to do with the increasing amount of faulty analysis and misinformation as well as the peddling of lousy conspiracy theories on the internet.
Why is this a big problem? Because a lot of readers are being misguided as to the true nature of the serious predicament we are facing. Half of the emails that I receive are from readers who are bringing up doubts based on other analysts’ faulty analysis and misinformation. Thus, it takes a great deal of effort to provide the real facts and data to counteract the damage being done by certain individuals, even those with good intentions.
Furthermore, an increasing number of so-called precious metals analysts have switched over to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, believing that gold and silver will no longer function as monetary metals. However, some of these analysts suggest that silver will still be valuable because it will be used as critical raw material in advanced products in our new HIGH-TECH WORLD. I find this idea of a future modern high-tech world quite amusing when we can’t even maintain the failing complex infrastructure we are currently using.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Jeffrey Sachs Still Promotes Disaster
Amedeo Modigliani Elvira Resting at a Table 1919Many of you are undoubtedly familiar with Naomi Klein’s 2007 book “The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism”, in which she describes how neoliberalism, as developed by Milton Friedman and his Chicago School, wreaks often very brutal and bloody havoc upon societies under the guise of ‘crisis as an opportunity for change’, first in Latin America and later also in Eastern Europe.
One of the most prominent actors in the book, the man behind the term ‘shock therapy’ for economies, is Jeffrey Sachs, a Harvard prodigy. In an interview at the time, Klein had this to say:
Q: You mention the shift from shock therapy to shock-and-awe, but there are also attempts to soften the image of neoliberalism. Jeffrey Sachs, the economist who pioneered shock therapy, wrote his latest book on The End of Poverty. Is there any more to this than a rebranding exercise?
A: A lot of people are under the impression that Jeffrey Sachs has renounced his past as a shock therapist and is doing penance now. But if you read The End of Poverty more closely he continues to defend these policies, but simply says there should be a greater cushion for the people at the bottom. The real legacy of neoliberalism is the story of the income gap. It destroyed the tools that narrowed the gap between rich and poor.
The very people who opened up this violent divide might now be saying that we have to do something for the people at the very bottom, but they still have nothing to say for the people in the middle who’ve lost everything.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
December 1, 2017
Sarnia-born professor looks to future
(Submitted photo)
The world is racing towards a large-scale impending collapse, and if humans want to avoid a future filled with social, political and environmental catastrophe, they would do well to devolve and democratize society’s decision-making process, currently in the hands of a select few.
So said Sarnia-born author Kevin MacKay, during a presentation at the Sarnia Public Library on Thursday.
The Mohawk College sociology professor and union activist touched on a number of themes related to the collapse of industrial society and also the shifts needed to avert such a fate. Those subjects are covered in MacKay’s recently released book, Radical Transformation: Oligarchy, Collapse and the Crisis of Civilization.
Six years in the making, the book is a product of research, reading and conversations with experts in a variety of fields, as well as activists in several grassroots movements, MacKay said.
With a world that appears to be veering off course, he said Radical Transformation is a guidebook to understand why society seems to be becoming more chaotic. It’s also a book of solutions, he said, pointing the way to a better, more egalitarian and just future.
“My book deals with some discourse that’s emerged recently – there are people, very knowledgeable people, who are basically talking about the threat that our society could actually collapse, that our civilization is going to hit the wall,” he said. “There are a number of scientists and ecologists who have been saying that over the past several years, so my book is looking at this idea: are we in fact driving industrial civilization off a cliff? I explore the crises we’re facing, whether that’s in the ecological, political or economic areas. And then I end up looking at what we can do to change course.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Little Rocket Man’s Risky Game
Little Rocket Man’s Risky Game
In the morning darkness of Wednesday, Kim Jong Un launched an ICBM that rose almost 2,800 miles into the sky before falling into the Sea of Japan.
North Korea now has the proven ability to hit Washington, D.C.
Unproven still is whether Kim can put a miniaturized nuclear warhead atop that missile, which could be fired with precision, and survive the severe vibrations of re-entry. More tests and more time are needed for that.
Thus, U.S. markets brushed off the news of Kim’s Hwasong-15 missile and roared to record heights on Wednesday and Thursday.
President Donald Trump took it less well. “Little Rocket Man” is one “sick puppy,” he told an audience in Missouri.
U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley told the Security Council that “if war comes … the North Korean regime will be utterly destroyed.” She then warned Xi Jinping that “if China does not halt the oil shipments” to North Korea, “we can take the oil situation into our own hands.”
Is Haley talking about bombing pipelines in North Korea — or China?
The rage of the president and bluster of Haley reflect a painful reality: As inhumane and ruthless as the 33-year-old dictator of North Korea is, he is playing the highest stakes poker game on the planet, against the world’s superpower, and playing it remarkably well.
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Reason: Kim may understand us better than we do him, which is why he seems less hesitant to invite the risks of a war he cannot win.
While a Korean War II might well end with annihilation of the North’s army and Kim’s regime, it would almost surely result in untold thousands of dead South Koreans and Americans.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
John Kerry: Israel And Saudi Arabia Urged A Preemptive US Strike On Iran Prior To Nuclear Deal
Former Secretary of State John Kerry revealed earlier this week that just prior to negotiations on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the leaders of Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia pushed hard for the US to preemptively strike Iran. Kerry divulged the information during a panel discussion at a nuclear weapons reduction forum at Washington National Cathedral on Tuesday where he defended the deal, saying those that wanted harsher action would have led the nation into another major Middle East war.
Kerry described the lead up to the deal as involving intense and aggressive lobbying toward military escalation by the three countries, whose leaders attempted to personally intervene. “Each of them said to me: You have to bomb Iran, it’s the only thing they are going to understand,” Kerry related at Tuesday’s forum.
He further explained, “I remember that conversation with President Mubarak. I looked at him and said: It’s easy for you to say. We go bomb them and I bet you’ll be the first guy out there the next day to criticize us for doing it. And he went: ‘Of course, ha-ha-ha-ha!’”
Kerry also identified Benjamin Netanyahu as taking a clear lead role in pushing for direct military action against Iran, saying, “It was a trap in a lot of ways. But more importantly, Prime Minister Netanyahu was genuinely agitating towards action.”
Though it’s not clear exactly when these exchanges took place, Kerry chaired the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2006-2013 before his term as Secretary of State under Obama. This was also the same post-Iraq invasion period that regime change in Syria was being openly discussed. Syria has long been seen as Iran’s closest ally and as constituting a key potential geographic land bridge linking Shia allies from Iran and Iraq to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The End of Economic Growth
UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Phillip Hammond (finance minister) delivered his budget on Wednesday last week. The tame budget was overshadowed by news that UK productivity and hence economic growth had stalled. In this post I search for the underlying causes of economic malaise and explore the structure of UK GDP; UK Government and private debt levels; demographics, in particular our ageing population; Higher Education policy, in particular over-production of sub-prime graduates and lastly UK Energy Policy that is focussed on high cost inefficient energy systems.
It has been frustrating to say the least listening to politicians, their advisors and a host of media commentators proclaim surprise and bewilderment that the UK economy seemed to be broken. Since no one seems to know how it broke, then it is clear no one will know how to fix it, if it can indeed be fixed. In this post I voice opinions on several factors that have combined to create these unwelcome circumstances and in the traditions of this blog, there is an energy theme, which I will leave until last touching on the topics of debt, demographics and sub-prime education en-route.
In very simple terms, the size of the UK economy can be expressed as the number of people times their average economic output. A refined measure would be the number of working-age people (16 to 66) times their average economic output. Economic growth is defined as the percentage change of this aggregate productivity from one year to the next. With the current economic model, growth is vital to the country since it feeds directly through to tax receipts used to deliver public services such as health care, welfare, education and defence. The level of aggregate borrowing (national debt) considered prudent may also be compared to GDP. If GDP growth stalls, so does the ability of the government to borrow prudently to finance public services.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Top 30 Risky Banks – Does it Really Matter?
The Royal Bank of Canada (RPC) has been added to the list of the top 30 banks posing the greatest risk. The top US bank is JP Morgan which is now the only bank required to hold an extra 2.5% of common equity after its US peer Citigroup moved down a tier required to hold 2% extra.
All of this is very nice, but also misleading. The Stress Tests by no means are realistic. It is assuming a single failure and certainly does not even take into consideration a CONTAGION, which nobody understands and there have been no models that will even simulate such events outside of what we have specialized in. The CONTAGION is what created the Great Depression and Herbert Hoover in his memoirs explain how capital acted “like a loose cannon on the deck of the world in a tempest-tossed ers.” Even the CONTAGION that hit in 2010 when Greece petitioned the IMF for a loan and traders immediately looked to see which country would be next, people do not understand that once blood is drawn, capital responds rapidly in the entire spectrum.
Even during the Long-Term Capital Management debacle in 1998, the crisis was in Russia. That sets off a need for liquidity and then all other markets are liquidated trying to raise cash. This is how a CONTAGION unfolds overpowering the fundamental analysis entirely.
Economics to this day still does not comprehend the CONTAGION that hit in 1931. It is the CONTAGION that presents the most significant clear and present danger to society as a whole. This is what reshapes countries and politics. We saw in 1933 Hitler, Mao, and FDR all come to power.
Inflation Surges as Economy Bogs Down in Mexico
Bank of Mexico caught in a vise.
In the last week, the governor of the Bank of Mexico (or Banxico), Augustin Carstens, stepped down in order to take over the reins as general manager of the Bank for International Settlements in Basil, Switzerland, while Finance Minister José Antonio Meade, handed in his resignation to run as the presidential candidate for the governing PRI party in next year’s general elections.
Despite the fact that the country’s two most senior public financial officials have left their posts within days of one another, and though the Mexican stock index is down about 9% from July, the markets still seem pretty sanguine.
But that doesn’t mean that problems are not stacking up.
Earlier this year Carstens felt compelled to postpone by five months his departure from Banxico, which was initially scheduled for May, in the hope that his continued presence would help steady investor nerves as well as tame inflation, which began soaring after the government’s one-off hike in gas prices at the beginning of this year.
It didn’t quite work out that way. Despite the Bank of Mexico’s policy rate of 7%, consumer prices in Mexico hit a higher-than-expected annual rate of 6.6% in the first two weeks of November. “Obviously, the final photo of my mandate isn’t the best,” Mr Carstens told the FT.
While inflation has surged, economic growth remains sluggish compared with many other countries, including Mexico’s direct neighbor to the north. Banxico is forecasting growth this year of 1.8% to 2.3%. But even that may end up proving to be optimistic after it was revealed this week that third-quarter gross domestic product had shrunk by 0.3% compared with the previous quarter, as manufacturing declined more than expected. It was the first quarter-to-quarter GDP contraction since Q4 2015.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Censorship Comes to Google
Censorship Comes to Google
Senator Feinstein rather boldly asked Google to take action to hamper RT’s ability to communicate its views to American audiences.
At Saturday’s Halifax International Security Forum, Eric Schmidt announced that Google will alter its search algorithm to “de-rank” results from Russia Today.
Why did Google do this? Perhaps they were concerned about Russia meddling in American elections or they thought their customers wished to see less of Russia Today. It matters not. Generally, Google has broad power to police its platform. We might not like the decision, but it is not ours to make.
Feinstein boldly asked Google to hamper RT’s ability to communicate with American audiences.
There is a second possibility. Government officials may have threatened Google to bring about this “de-ranking” of Russia Today. If so, the First Amendment poses questions for us. We need to answer such questions, however, only if government officials did, in fact, threaten Google.
Congressional Pressure on Google
Consider the following exchange between Sen. Feinstein and Google General Counsel Kent Walker from the Senate Intelligence Committee hearings on Russian influence in the 2016 election:
Feinstein: Why didn’t Google take any action regarding RT after the intelligence community assessment came out in January of 2017.
Walker: … with regard to RT, we recognize the concerns that have been expressed about RT and concerns about its slanted coverage, this is of course a question that goes beyond the internet, RT is covered, its channel is on major cable television stations, on satellite television stations, its advertising appears in newspapers, magazines, airports, it’s run in hotels in pretty much every city in the United States.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Internecine Deep State Conflict Moves to Stage Two
It now seems evident that the Neoliberal Camp of the U.S. Deep State is highly vulnerable on an individual basis.
I tend to notice things like a year-old blog entry suddenly getting thousands of page views. The essay that received a surge of recent interest: Is the Deep State at War–With Itself? (December 13, 2016).
I’m reprinting the essay below for those interested, as nothing has emerged to change the conclusions.
That in itself reveals that the internecine war within America’s Deep State is if anything heating up as those attempting to hang a “Russian collusion” narrative on their Deep State opponents have failed to produce any proof of this collusion despite a year of effort.
Then all of a sudden big political donor Harvey Weinstein gets taken down for behaviors that have been well-known within the circles of power for 20+ years. So what changed? Why did Mr. Weinstein’s protective wall suddenly fail after serving him so effectively for decades?
But Mr. Weinstein was only the first to fall. Now high-profile figures across the mainstream media are toppling like dominoes. Doesn’t it seem a bit peculiar that all these Protected Privileged are suddenly being exposed, disgraced and removed from positions of influence and power?
Maybe it’s just random coincidence, but I doubt it. It has the scent of an intentional covert campaign. It’s well known that the mainstream media and Hollywood has been in bed with the security agencies for decades, and so it seems non-random that suddenly all these big-shots have lost their Protected Privileged Status more or less at once.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but it looks like those who played on the losing side’s team (or cheered from the sidelines) just had their privileges revoked.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
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