- Source, Cheddar.com
Wednesday, July 31, 2019
Preparing to Protect Your Wealth In An Economic Downturn
Saturday, July 27, 2019
James Rickards: Trump Wins Reelection if the Economy Avoids Recession
Best-selling financial author James Rickards
What does that mean for the chances of a second Trump Presidency? Rickards
Every month that goes by, the odds of a recession by next summer go down. So, the odds of Trump winning go up. I don’t want to debate the economics of the Fed and what they are doing, but the Fed is doing what it needs to do to avoid a recession, and that improves Trump’s odds.
Right now, I have Trump as the winner.” After the 2020 Presidential Election, Rickards is much less optimistic and so are the wealthy elite. Rickards siloes
Here’s another interesting thing, hedge fund billionaires may trade stocks, bonds and currencies all day long, but when you ask them where do you have your own money, every one of them that I have spoken to have gold, physical gold.
They all have gold. They don’t trade it, but they have it.” Rickards covers a lot of ground in this in-depth interview that is more than one hour in length.
Rickards discusses the world’s massive debt, probability of big defaults and huge inflation all coming in the “Aftermath” of the coming crisis...
- Source, USA Watchdog
Monday, July 22, 2019
Jim Rickards: This is Exactly How You Survive the Coming Financial Crisis and Prosper
- Source, Jay Taylor Media
Friday, July 19, 2019
Jim Rickards: Wealth Preservation Survival Guide for the Coming Chaos
Author, financial expert, and investment advisor Jim Rickards joins today's Liberty Report to discuss his upcoming book, "Aftermath: Seven Secrets of Wealth Preservation in the Coming Chaos."
- Source, Ron Paul
Sunday, July 14, 2019
Economist Jim Rickards On Gold Versus Bitcoin
He believes gold can go to $10,000 an ounce but he is much more skeptical about bitcoin.
Rickards doesn't trust the bitcoin price action and doesn't believe the cryptocurrency will fare well in a financial crisis.
- Source, Money Insider
Tuesday, July 9, 2019
Jim Rickards Claims Victory in Gold VS Bitcoin Debate
- Source, Sprott Media
Monday, July 1, 2019
Wall Street and the New Cold War
The stock market seems to rise or fall almost daily based on the latest news from the front lines of the trade wars.
When Trump threatens new tariffs and China threatens to retaliate in kind, stocks fall. When Trump delays the tariffs and China agrees to resume negotiations, stocks rise. And so it goes. It has been this way since January 2018 when the trade war began.
The latest dust-up came late last week when Trump threatened tariffs against Mexico if it doesn’t do more to curb illegal immigration to the U.S. Markets sold off on Friday as a result, bringing a terrible May to an end. Largely due to the trade war, the stock market had its worst May in seven years.
From the start, Wall Street underestimated the impact of the trade war. First they said Trump was bluffing. Then the analysts said that Trump and Xi would put their differences aside and make an historic deal.
All of these analyses were wrong. The trade war was problematic from the start and is growing worse today.
China will lose the trade war. The reasons are obvious. Foreign trade is a much larger percentage of Chinese GDP than it is for the U.S., so a trade war was always bound to have more impact on China than the U.S.
And if China tries to match the U.S. in tariffs dollar for dollar, they run out of headroom at $150 billion while the U.S. can keep going up to $500 billion and inflict far more pain on China.
Other forms of Chinese retaliation are mostly nonstarters. They cannot dump U.S. Treasuries without hurting their own reserve position and risking an account freeze by the U.S. China cannot turn up the pressure by stealing intellectual property because they’re already doing that to the greatest extent possible.
China’s latest threat is to ban exports of “rare earths” to the U.S. and its allies. Rare earths are essential for the production of plasma screens, fiber optics, lasers and other high-tech applications. Electric vehicles, mobile phones and telecommunications systems would be impossible to build without them. China is responsible for 90% of global production, which makes them a potent weapon in the U.S.-China trade wars.
“Rare” earths aren’t actually that rare. They are plentiful in quantity. The problem is that they are found in extremely low concentrations. This means a huge amount of ore and expensive mining processes are needed to extract even a small amount of these vital substances.
So rare earths are one weapon China possesses.
But over time, Western powers can replace rare earths purchased from China. There could be major manufacturing disruption in the meantime, it’s true. But it would not be the end of the world.
The U.S. will win the trade war and either China will open its markets and buy more U.S. goods or the Chinese economy will slow significantly.
But while the trade war is important, it’s not the main event.
The trade war is part of a much larger struggle between China and the U.S. for hegemony in Asia and the Western Pacific.
They are locked in a new cold war being fought on many fronts. These include trade; technology; rights of passage in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea; and alliances in South Asia, where China’s Belt and Road Initiative is promising billions of dollars for infrastructure development.
The U.S. is responding with arms deals and bilateral trade deals to counter Chinese influence. Even if a modest trade deal is worked out with China this summer, it will not put an end to the larger struggle now underway.
What are the implications?
If the Chinese view the trade war as just one step in a protracted cold war, which I believe they do, then we’re in for a long period of contracting growth that will not be confined to China but will affect the entire world.
That seems the most likely outcome for now. Get set for slower growth and perhaps stagflation. It could be like the late 1970s all over again.
Slowly, Wall Street is taking the trade wars seriously. But it is still missing its larger implications of a new cold war.
This new cold war could last for decades and it will affect the entire global economy. Let’s just hope it doesn’t turn into a shooting war.
When Trump threatens new tariffs and China threatens to retaliate in kind, stocks fall. When Trump delays the tariffs and China agrees to resume negotiations, stocks rise. And so it goes. It has been this way since January 2018 when the trade war began.
The latest dust-up came late last week when Trump threatened tariffs against Mexico if it doesn’t do more to curb illegal immigration to the U.S. Markets sold off on Friday as a result, bringing a terrible May to an end. Largely due to the trade war, the stock market had its worst May in seven years.
From the start, Wall Street underestimated the impact of the trade war. First they said Trump was bluffing. Then the analysts said that Trump and Xi would put their differences aside and make an historic deal.
All of these analyses were wrong. The trade war was problematic from the start and is growing worse today.
China will lose the trade war. The reasons are obvious. Foreign trade is a much larger percentage of Chinese GDP than it is for the U.S., so a trade war was always bound to have more impact on China than the U.S.
And if China tries to match the U.S. in tariffs dollar for dollar, they run out of headroom at $150 billion while the U.S. can keep going up to $500 billion and inflict far more pain on China.
Other forms of Chinese retaliation are mostly nonstarters. They cannot dump U.S. Treasuries without hurting their own reserve position and risking an account freeze by the U.S. China cannot turn up the pressure by stealing intellectual property because they’re already doing that to the greatest extent possible.
China’s latest threat is to ban exports of “rare earths” to the U.S. and its allies. Rare earths are essential for the production of plasma screens, fiber optics, lasers and other high-tech applications. Electric vehicles, mobile phones and telecommunications systems would be impossible to build without them. China is responsible for 90% of global production, which makes them a potent weapon in the U.S.-China trade wars.
“Rare” earths aren’t actually that rare. They are plentiful in quantity. The problem is that they are found in extremely low concentrations. This means a huge amount of ore and expensive mining processes are needed to extract even a small amount of these vital substances.
So rare earths are one weapon China possesses.
But over time, Western powers can replace rare earths purchased from China. There could be major manufacturing disruption in the meantime, it’s true. But it would not be the end of the world.
The U.S. will win the trade war and either China will open its markets and buy more U.S. goods or the Chinese economy will slow significantly.
But while the trade war is important, it’s not the main event.
The trade war is part of a much larger struggle between China and the U.S. for hegemony in Asia and the Western Pacific.
They are locked in a new cold war being fought on many fronts. These include trade; technology; rights of passage in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea; and alliances in South Asia, where China’s Belt and Road Initiative is promising billions of dollars for infrastructure development.
The U.S. is responding with arms deals and bilateral trade deals to counter Chinese influence. Even if a modest trade deal is worked out with China this summer, it will not put an end to the larger struggle now underway.
What are the implications?
If the Chinese view the trade war as just one step in a protracted cold war, which I believe they do, then we’re in for a long period of contracting growth that will not be confined to China but will affect the entire world.
That seems the most likely outcome for now. Get set for slower growth and perhaps stagflation. It could be like the late 1970s all over again.
Slowly, Wall Street is taking the trade wars seriously. But it is still missing its larger implications of a new cold war.
This new cold war could last for decades and it will affect the entire global economy. Let’s just hope it doesn’t turn into a shooting war.
- Source, James Rickards via the Daily Reckoning
Wednesday, June 26, 2019
James Rickards: If Gold Was Just a Barbarous Relic...
There’s nothing new about the Russian accumulation of gold bullion in their reserve position. It began in a material way in 2009 when Russia had about 600 metric tonnes of gold.
Today, Russia has 2,183 metric tonnes, a stunning 264% increase in less than 10 years. Russia is the sixth-largest gold power in the world after the U.S., Germany, IMF, Italy and France.
Russia’s gold hoard is over 25% of the U.S. hoard, but Russia’s economy is only 8% the size of the U.S. economy. This gives Russia a gold-to-GDP ratio over three times that of the U.S.
While these developments are well-known, the question of why Russia is accumulating so much gold has never been answered.
One reason is as a dollar hedge. Russia is the second-largest energy producer in the world. Most of that energy is sold for dollars. Russia can hedge potential dollar inflation by buying gold.
Another reason has to do with the avoidance of U.S. sanctions. Gold is nondigital and does not move through electronic payments systems, so it is impossible for the U.S. to freeze on interdict.
Yet a deeper reason is that Russia has a long-term plan to subvert the dollar’s role as the leading global reserve currency. The Russian ruble is not positioned to be a reserve currency, but a new cryptocurrency backed by gold would be a good candidate.
The Central Bank of Russia will consider a new study that suggests just such a gold-backed cryptocurrency to settle balance of payments among willing participants. This plan is in its preliminary stages and is a long way from reality at this point.
Still, the Russian endgame has now been revealed. The dollar’s days as the leading reserve currency are numbered.
Of course, Russia is not the only nation accumulating gold as a means to move away from the dollar. You can certainly add China to that list, and many others.
The latest move comes from Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. He promoted the idea of a common trading currency for East Asia that would be pegged to gold. “The currency that we propose should be based on gold because gold is much more stable,” he said.
I’ve actually advised Mahathir Mohamad in the past and he’s very familiar with my writings on gold. So I’m not surprised he’s issuing this call.
The global monetary regime has collapsed three times over the past 100 years, in 1914, 1939, and 1971. They seem to happen about every 30 to 40 years on average. It’s now been over 40 years since the last collapse, so we’re due.
Got gold?
Today, Russia has 2,183 metric tonnes, a stunning 264% increase in less than 10 years. Russia is the sixth-largest gold power in the world after the U.S., Germany, IMF, Italy and France.
Russia’s gold hoard is over 25% of the U.S. hoard, but Russia’s economy is only 8% the size of the U.S. economy. This gives Russia a gold-to-GDP ratio over three times that of the U.S.
While these developments are well-known, the question of why Russia is accumulating so much gold has never been answered.
One reason is as a dollar hedge. Russia is the second-largest energy producer in the world. Most of that energy is sold for dollars. Russia can hedge potential dollar inflation by buying gold.
Another reason has to do with the avoidance of U.S. sanctions. Gold is nondigital and does not move through electronic payments systems, so it is impossible for the U.S. to freeze on interdict.
Yet a deeper reason is that Russia has a long-term plan to subvert the dollar’s role as the leading global reserve currency. The Russian ruble is not positioned to be a reserve currency, but a new cryptocurrency backed by gold would be a good candidate.
The Central Bank of Russia will consider a new study that suggests just such a gold-backed cryptocurrency to settle balance of payments among willing participants. This plan is in its preliminary stages and is a long way from reality at this point.
Still, the Russian endgame has now been revealed. The dollar’s days as the leading reserve currency are numbered.
Of course, Russia is not the only nation accumulating gold as a means to move away from the dollar. You can certainly add China to that list, and many others.
The latest move comes from Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad. He promoted the idea of a common trading currency for East Asia that would be pegged to gold. “The currency that we propose should be based on gold because gold is much more stable,” he said.
I’ve actually advised Mahathir Mohamad in the past and he’s very familiar with my writings on gold. So I’m not surprised he’s issuing this call.
The global monetary regime has collapsed three times over the past 100 years, in 1914, 1939, and 1971. They seem to happen about every 30 to 40 years on average. It’s now been over 40 years since the last collapse, so we’re due.
Got gold?
- Source, James Rickards
Saturday, June 22, 2019
Jim Rickards: The Perfect Storm is Coming
People often refer to the “perfect storm.” A perfect storm is generally understood as two or more events that are independent but converge to produce an outcome much worse than either event alone.
The term is an overused cliché, and as a writer I avoid clichés whenever possible. But though rare, perfect storms do exist. The most common example is the devastating 1991 storm popularized by the book and movie of the same name, although it was initially known as the “Halloween storm.”
In that case, three separate weather dynamics all converged in one place on one day to produce a perfect storm. The odds of all three coming together at once were less than one in 100,000. That’s less than once in 270 years. That’s a perfect storm.
Do metaphorical perfect storms happen in politics and capital markets?
The answer is yes, provided the conditions of the perfect storm definition are satisfied. The multiple events that make up the true perfect storm must be independent and rare and come to converge in an almost impossible way.
Unfortunately, a political and market perfect storm is now on the way and may strike as early as Halloween 2019, marking a new “Halloween storm.” Get ready.
Today I’ll be discussing the components making up this perfect storm, and how I see them all coming together at the same time.
In my 40-plus years in banking and capital markets, I have lived through a number of financial fiascos that arguably qualify as perfect storms.
1970: Penn Central bankruptcy, the largest in history at that time
1973–74: Arab oil embargo
1977–80: U.S. hyperinflation
1982–85: Latin American debt crisis
1987: One-day 22% stock market crash
1988–92: Savings and loan (S&L) crisis
1994: Mexican tequila crisis
1997: Asian financial crisis
1998: Russia/Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) crisis
2000:Dot-com crash
2007: Mortgage market collapse
2008: Lehman Bros./AIG financial panic.
I was not just a bystander at these events. From 1977–85, I worked at Citibank and dealt with inflation, currencies and Latin America from a front-row seat.
From 1985–93 I worked for a major government bond dealer that financed S&Ls and traded their mortgages.
From 1994–99, I was at LTCM and dealt in all the major international markets. I negotiated the LTCM rescue by Wall Street in September 1998.
In 1999–2000 I ran a tech startup, and in 2007–08 I was an investment banker and financial threat adviser to the CIA.
That’s a lot of action for one career, but it also makes the point that financial perfect storms happen more frequently than standard models expect.
Here’s what I learned: Every one of these episodes was preceded by mass complacency or euphoria.
Before the Arab oil embargo, we expected cheap oil forever. Before the Latin American debt crisis, countries like Brazil and Argentina were “the land of the future.”
The term is an overused cliché, and as a writer I avoid clichés whenever possible. But though rare, perfect storms do exist. The most common example is the devastating 1991 storm popularized by the book and movie of the same name, although it was initially known as the “Halloween storm.”
In that case, three separate weather dynamics all converged in one place on one day to produce a perfect storm. The odds of all three coming together at once were less than one in 100,000. That’s less than once in 270 years. That’s a perfect storm.
Do metaphorical perfect storms happen in politics and capital markets?
The answer is yes, provided the conditions of the perfect storm definition are satisfied. The multiple events that make up the true perfect storm must be independent and rare and come to converge in an almost impossible way.
Unfortunately, a political and market perfect storm is now on the way and may strike as early as Halloween 2019, marking a new “Halloween storm.” Get ready.
Today I’ll be discussing the components making up this perfect storm, and how I see them all coming together at the same time.
In my 40-plus years in banking and capital markets, I have lived through a number of financial fiascos that arguably qualify as perfect storms.
Here’s a partial list:
1970: Penn Central bankruptcy, the largest in history at that time
1973–74: Arab oil embargo
1977–80: U.S. hyperinflation
1982–85: Latin American debt crisis
1987: One-day 22% stock market crash
1988–92: Savings and loan (S&L) crisis
1994: Mexican tequila crisis
1997: Asian financial crisis
1998: Russia/Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) crisis
2000:Dot-com crash
2007: Mortgage market collapse
2008: Lehman Bros./AIG financial panic.
I was not just a bystander at these events. From 1977–85, I worked at Citibank and dealt with inflation, currencies and Latin America from a front-row seat.
From 1985–93 I worked for a major government bond dealer that financed S&Ls and traded their mortgages.
From 1994–99, I was at LTCM and dealt in all the major international markets. I negotiated the LTCM rescue by Wall Street in September 1998.
In 1999–2000 I ran a tech startup, and in 2007–08 I was an investment banker and financial threat adviser to the CIA.
That’s a lot of action for one career, but it also makes the point that financial perfect storms happen more frequently than standard models expect.
Here’s what I learned: Every one of these episodes was preceded by mass complacency or euphoria.
Before the Arab oil embargo, we expected cheap oil forever. Before the Latin American debt crisis, countries like Brazil and Argentina were “the land of the future.”
- Source, Daily Reckoning via Jim Rickards
Tuesday, June 18, 2019
Four Reasons to Consider Gold In 2019
Here are just 4 of the largest current threats to the global economy, which all point to the viability of a Gold IRA to diversify your retirement portfolio:
1. Global Tensions and Conflicts
North Korea’s disarmament plans have ground to a halt. The U.S. decision to renege on the Iranian Nuclear Deal has tensions high and the recent U.S. backing of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital has further fanned the growing flames of perceived U.S. Mideast “interference.”
Another group of foreign diplomats are uneasy about U.S. support for Venezuela’s opposition leader, Juan Guaido. And today’s lower oil prices could become a distant memory if a host of Middle East relations do not improve and quickly. All of these factors can cause sudden chaos in the stock market, but rarely impact gold prices heavily.
2. U.S. National Debt
It’s not only concerning that we’ve passed the $22 trillion deficit mark, but even more concerning is the fact that the last $1 trillion was added in less than a year (for the first time ever). $22 trillion is more than the entire U.S. economy!
This condition is not only unsustainable, there appears to be no planned end in sight. Erosion of the dollar’s value continues as Baby Boomers continue to file for social security from a fund that’s been hemorrhaging for decades. China and Russia are lobbying and eager to fill a void being created by a continuing decline of the dollar’s value.
3. Banking Blunders and Bail-Ins
A big part of the 2008 financial meltdown had to do with a bank’s misuse of derivatives, which in 2018 achieved heights exponentially greater than 2008 levels. And for all the complaining about Dodd-Frank, the one thing that no one seems to be aware of is actually THE MOST IMPORTANT FACT: All bank deposits immediately become bank assets in the event of insolvency!
This means taxpayers are no longer a bank’s first line of defense. Instead, that “privilege” has been quietly dumped onto depositors. Your Checking or Savings accounts can now legally and without recourse be commandeered for the bank’s own financial needs.
4. An Oversold Stock Market
Top analysts have been warning about the growing possibility of a market crash even greater than the one experienced during the Great Depression. They hurry to point out the suspicious lack of “significant” corrections during the recent bull market, which became the longest in our history last year.
Just one factor in their concerns is the fact that public companies borrowed $1.1 trillion in cheap Fed money, made available by the Fed’s notorious Quantitative Easing program, which was earmarked for wage increases, infrastructure, and expansion. Then they spent $1.2 trillion on stock buyback programs that inflated stock prices, but did virtually nothing beneficial for the company, particularly in potential growth or even maintenance.
These warnings signs have led analysts predict a 70% correction this year. In fact, the CIA's Financial Threat Advisor Jim Rickards even stated on Money Morning that he believes a 70% drop is the best case scenario...
1. Global Tensions and Conflicts
North Korea’s disarmament plans have ground to a halt. The U.S. decision to renege on the Iranian Nuclear Deal has tensions high and the recent U.S. backing of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital has further fanned the growing flames of perceived U.S. Mideast “interference.”
Another group of foreign diplomats are uneasy about U.S. support for Venezuela’s opposition leader, Juan Guaido. And today’s lower oil prices could become a distant memory if a host of Middle East relations do not improve and quickly. All of these factors can cause sudden chaos in the stock market, but rarely impact gold prices heavily.
2. U.S. National Debt
It’s not only concerning that we’ve passed the $22 trillion deficit mark, but even more concerning is the fact that the last $1 trillion was added in less than a year (for the first time ever). $22 trillion is more than the entire U.S. economy!
This condition is not only unsustainable, there appears to be no planned end in sight. Erosion of the dollar’s value continues as Baby Boomers continue to file for social security from a fund that’s been hemorrhaging for decades. China and Russia are lobbying and eager to fill a void being created by a continuing decline of the dollar’s value.
3. Banking Blunders and Bail-Ins
A big part of the 2008 financial meltdown had to do with a bank’s misuse of derivatives, which in 2018 achieved heights exponentially greater than 2008 levels. And for all the complaining about Dodd-Frank, the one thing that no one seems to be aware of is actually THE MOST IMPORTANT FACT: All bank deposits immediately become bank assets in the event of insolvency!
This means taxpayers are no longer a bank’s first line of defense. Instead, that “privilege” has been quietly dumped onto depositors. Your Checking or Savings accounts can now legally and without recourse be commandeered for the bank’s own financial needs.
4. An Oversold Stock Market
Top analysts have been warning about the growing possibility of a market crash even greater than the one experienced during the Great Depression. They hurry to point out the suspicious lack of “significant” corrections during the recent bull market, which became the longest in our history last year.
Just one factor in their concerns is the fact that public companies borrowed $1.1 trillion in cheap Fed money, made available by the Fed’s notorious Quantitative Easing program, which was earmarked for wage increases, infrastructure, and expansion. Then they spent $1.2 trillion on stock buyback programs that inflated stock prices, but did virtually nothing beneficial for the company, particularly in potential growth or even maintenance.
These warnings signs have led analysts predict a 70% correction this year. In fact, the CIA's Financial Threat Advisor Jim Rickards even stated on Money Morning that he believes a 70% drop is the best case scenario...
- Source, JPost
Monday, June 3, 2019
Crypto Is Here to Stay, Bitcoin Isn’t
Bitcoin has staged a notable comeback from its 2018 crash. From a level of about $4,000 through the month of March, 2019, bitcoin had a two-day 23% spike from $4,135 on April 1, 2019 to $5,102 on April 3, 2019.
Bitcoin then moved sideways in the $5,000 to $6,000 range until May 8, 2019 when it staged another three-day spike from $5,932 on May 8 to $7,255 on May 11, a 22% surge.
Combining the April 1 and May 8 spikes, the bitcoin price moved from $4,135 to $7,255 for a spectacular 75% price rally in six weeks.
By last Thursday morning, it soared even higher, to over $8,300.
This rally was bitcoin’s best price performance since its 83% collapse from $20,000 in late December 2017 to $3,300 in December 2018. That crash marked the collapse of the greatest asset price bubble in history, larger even than the Tulipmania of 1637.
The questions for crypto investors are what caused the recent rebound in the price of bitcoin and will it last? Is this the start of a new mega-rally or just another price ramp and manipulation? Has anything fundamental changed?
If you’re beginning to suspect these are leading questions, you’re right.
Of course, bitcoin technical analysts are out in force explaining how the 100-day moving average crossed the 200-day moving average, a bullish sign. They are also quick to add that the 30-day moving average is gaining strength, another bullish sign.
My view is that technical analysis applied to bitcoin is nonsense. There are two reasons for this. The first is that there is nothing to analyze except the price itself. When you look at technical analysis applied to stocks, bonds, commodities, foreign exchange or other tradeable goods, there is an underlying asset or story embedded in the price.
Oil prices might move on geopolitical fears related to Iran. Bond prices might move on disinflation fears related to demographics. In both cases (and many others), the price reflects real-world factors. Technical analysis is simply an effort to digest price movements into comprehensible predictive analytics.
With bitcoin (to paraphrase Gertrude Stein) “there is no there, there.” Bitcoin is a digital record. Some argue it’s money; (I’m highly skeptical it meets the basic definition of money).
Either way, bitcoin does not reflect corporate assets, national economic strength, terms of trade, energy demand or any of the myriad factors by which other asset prices are judged. Technical analysis is meaningless when the price itself is meaningless in relation to any goods, services, assets or other claims.
My other reason for rejecting the utility of technical analysis is that it has low predictive value when applied to substantial assets and no predictive value at all when applied to bitcoin.
If you follow technical analysis, you’ll see that every “incorrect” prediction is followed immediately by a new analysis in which a “double top” merely presages a “triple top” and so on.
Technical analysis can help clarify where the price has been and help with relative value analysis, but its predictive analytic value is low (except to the extent the technical analysis itself produces self-fulfilling prophesies through herd behavior).
That said, what can we take away from the recent bitcoin price rally, putting aside its flash crash for the moment?
The first relevant fact is that no one knows why it happened. There was no new technological breakthrough in bitcoin mining. None of the scalability and sustainability challenges have been solved. Frauds and hacks continue to be revealed on an almost daily basis. In short, it’s business as usual in the bitcoin space with no new reasons for optimism or pessimism...
- Source, The Daily Reckoning
Thursday, May 30, 2019
James Rickards: The Trade Wars Are Back
President Trump shocked markets yesterday when he announced that a new, heavy round of tariffs on Chinese goods will take effect this Friday. Complacent markets had assumed that a trade deal would get done, that it was just a matter of sorting out the details. Now that is far from certain. Failing a last minute deal, which is certainly possible, the trade war is back. And it could get worse.
What most surprised me about the new trade war was not that it started, but that the mainstream financial media denied it was happening for so long. The media have consistently denied the impact of this trade war. Early headlines said that Trump was bluffing and would not follow through on the tariffs. He did. Later headlines said that China was just trying to save face and would not retaliate. They did.
Today the story line has been that the trade war will not have a large impact on macroeconomic growth. It will. The mainstream media have been wrong in their analysis at every stage of this trade war. And it did not see this latest salvo coming.
The bottom line is that the trade war is here, it’s highly impactful and it could get worse. The sooner investors and policymakers internalize that reality, the better off they’ll be.
For years I’ve been warning my readers that a global trade war was likely in the wake of the currency wars. This forecast seemed like a stretch to many. But it wasn’t.
I said it would simply be a replay of the sequence that prevailed from 1921–39 as the original currency war started by Weimar Germany morphed into trade wars started by the United States and finally shooting wars started by Japan in Asia and Germany in Europe.
The existing currency war started in 2010 with Obama’s National Export Initiative, which led directly to the cheapest dollar in history by August 2011. The currency war evolved into a trade war by January 2018, when Trump announced tariffs on solar panels and appliances mostly from China. Unfortunately, a shooting war cannot be ruled out given rising geopolitical tensions.
The reasons the currency war and trade war today are repeating the 1921–39 sequence are not hard to discern. Countries resort to currency wars when they face a global situation of too much debt and not enough growth.
Currency wars are a way to steal growth from trading partners by reducing the cost of exports. The problem is that this tactic does not work because trade partners retaliate by reducing the value of their own currencies. This competitive devaluation goes back and forth for years.
Everyone is worse off and no one wins.
Once leaders realize the currency wars are not working, they pivot to trade wars. The dynamic is the same. One country imposes tariffs on imports from another country. The idea is to reduce imports and the trade deficit, which improves growth. But the end result is the same as a currency war. Trade partners retaliate and everyone is worse off as global trade shrinks.
The currency wars and trade wars can exist side by side as they do today. Eventually, both financial tactics fail and the original problem of debt and growth persists. At that point, shooting wars emerge. Shooting wars do solve the problem because the winning side increases production and the losing side has infrastructure destroyed that needs to be rebuilt after the war.
Yet the human cost is high. The potential for shooting wars exists in North Korea, the South China Sea, Taiwan, Israel, Iran, Venezuela and elsewhere. Let’s hope things don’t get that far this time.
But the easiest way to understand the trade war dynamics is to take Trump at his word. Trump was not posturing or bluffing. He will agree to trade deals, but only on terms that improve the outlook for jobs and growth in the U.S. Trump is not a globalist; he’s a nationalist. That may not be popular among the elites, but that’s how he sets policy. Keeping that in mind will help with trade war analysis and predictions.
Trump is entirely focused on the U.S. trade deficit. He does not care about global supply chains or least-cost production. He cares about U.S. growth, and one way to increase growth is to reduce the trade deficit. That makes Trump’s trade policy a simple numbers game rather than a complicated multilateral puzzle palace.
If the U.S. can gain jobs at the expense of Korea or Vietnam, then Trump will do it; too bad for Korea and Vietnam. From there, the next step is to consider what’s causing the U.S. trade deficit. This chart tells the story. It shows the composite U.S. trade deficit broken down by specific trading partners:
The problem quickly becomes obvious. The U.S. trade deficit is due almost entirely to four trading partners: China, Mexico, Japan and Germany. Of those, China is 64% of the total.
President Trump has concluded a trade deal with Mexico that benefits both countries and will lead to a reduced trade deficit as Mexico buys more U.S. soybeans.
The U.S. has good relations with Japan and much U.S.-Japanese trade is already governed by agreements acceptable to both sides. This means the U.S. trade deficit problem is confined to China and Germany (often referred to euphemistically as “Europe” or the “EU”). The atmosphere between the U.S. and the EU when it comes to trade is still uneasy, but not critical.
But the global trade war is not global at all but really a slugfest between the U.S. and China, the world’s two largest economies. In the realm of global trade, the United States is an extremely desirable customer. In fact, for most, we are their best customer.
Think the still export-based Chinese economy can afford to sell significantly less manufactured goods across borders? Think that same Chinese economy can allow for a significant devaluation of U.S. sovereign debt? That’s their book, gang.
But China has finally come to the realization that the trade war is real and here to stay. Senior Chinese policymakers have referred to the trade war as part of a larger strategy of containment of Chinese ambitions that may lead to a new Cold War. They’re right.
Trump seems to relish the idea of bullying the Chinese in public. That’s certainly his style, but it’s also a risky strategy. To quote Sun Tzu: “Do not press a desperate foe too hard.”
China doesn’t like to be chastised publicly any more than anyone else, but culturally, saving-face may be more important to the Chinese. The Chinese are all about saving face and gaining face. That means they can walk away from a trade deal even if it damages them economically. Saving face is too important. But Trump is playing for keeps and will not back down either.
Unlike in other policy arenas, Trump has enjoyed bipartisan support in Congress. The Republicans have backed Trump from a national security perspective and the Democrats have backed him from a pro-labor perspective. China sees the handwriting on the wall.
This trade war will not end soon, because it’s part of something bigger and much more difficult to resolve. This is a struggle for hegemony in the 21st century. The trade war will be good for U.S. jobs but bad for global output. The stock market is going to wake up to this reality. The currency wars and trade wars are set to get worse.
Investors should prepare.
What most surprised me about the new trade war was not that it started, but that the mainstream financial media denied it was happening for so long. The media have consistently denied the impact of this trade war. Early headlines said that Trump was bluffing and would not follow through on the tariffs. He did. Later headlines said that China was just trying to save face and would not retaliate. They did.
Today the story line has been that the trade war will not have a large impact on macroeconomic growth. It will. The mainstream media have been wrong in their analysis at every stage of this trade war. And it did not see this latest salvo coming.
The bottom line is that the trade war is here, it’s highly impactful and it could get worse. The sooner investors and policymakers internalize that reality, the better off they’ll be.
For years I’ve been warning my readers that a global trade war was likely in the wake of the currency wars. This forecast seemed like a stretch to many. But it wasn’t.
I said it would simply be a replay of the sequence that prevailed from 1921–39 as the original currency war started by Weimar Germany morphed into trade wars started by the United States and finally shooting wars started by Japan in Asia and Germany in Europe.
The existing currency war started in 2010 with Obama’s National Export Initiative, which led directly to the cheapest dollar in history by August 2011. The currency war evolved into a trade war by January 2018, when Trump announced tariffs on solar panels and appliances mostly from China. Unfortunately, a shooting war cannot be ruled out given rising geopolitical tensions.
The reasons the currency war and trade war today are repeating the 1921–39 sequence are not hard to discern. Countries resort to currency wars when they face a global situation of too much debt and not enough growth.
Currency wars are a way to steal growth from trading partners by reducing the cost of exports. The problem is that this tactic does not work because trade partners retaliate by reducing the value of their own currencies. This competitive devaluation goes back and forth for years.
Everyone is worse off and no one wins.
Once leaders realize the currency wars are not working, they pivot to trade wars. The dynamic is the same. One country imposes tariffs on imports from another country. The idea is to reduce imports and the trade deficit, which improves growth. But the end result is the same as a currency war. Trade partners retaliate and everyone is worse off as global trade shrinks.
The currency wars and trade wars can exist side by side as they do today. Eventually, both financial tactics fail and the original problem of debt and growth persists. At that point, shooting wars emerge. Shooting wars do solve the problem because the winning side increases production and the losing side has infrastructure destroyed that needs to be rebuilt after the war.
Yet the human cost is high. The potential for shooting wars exists in North Korea, the South China Sea, Taiwan, Israel, Iran, Venezuela and elsewhere. Let’s hope things don’t get that far this time.
But the easiest way to understand the trade war dynamics is to take Trump at his word. Trump was not posturing or bluffing. He will agree to trade deals, but only on terms that improve the outlook for jobs and growth in the U.S. Trump is not a globalist; he’s a nationalist. That may not be popular among the elites, but that’s how he sets policy. Keeping that in mind will help with trade war analysis and predictions.
Trump is entirely focused on the U.S. trade deficit. He does not care about global supply chains or least-cost production. He cares about U.S. growth, and one way to increase growth is to reduce the trade deficit. That makes Trump’s trade policy a simple numbers game rather than a complicated multilateral puzzle palace.
If the U.S. can gain jobs at the expense of Korea or Vietnam, then Trump will do it; too bad for Korea and Vietnam. From there, the next step is to consider what’s causing the U.S. trade deficit. This chart tells the story. It shows the composite U.S. trade deficit broken down by specific trading partners:
The problem quickly becomes obvious. The U.S. trade deficit is due almost entirely to four trading partners: China, Mexico, Japan and Germany. Of those, China is 64% of the total.
President Trump has concluded a trade deal with Mexico that benefits both countries and will lead to a reduced trade deficit as Mexico buys more U.S. soybeans.
The U.S. has good relations with Japan and much U.S.-Japanese trade is already governed by agreements acceptable to both sides. This means the U.S. trade deficit problem is confined to China and Germany (often referred to euphemistically as “Europe” or the “EU”). The atmosphere between the U.S. and the EU when it comes to trade is still uneasy, but not critical.
But the global trade war is not global at all but really a slugfest between the U.S. and China, the world’s two largest economies. In the realm of global trade, the United States is an extremely desirable customer. In fact, for most, we are their best customer.
Think the still export-based Chinese economy can afford to sell significantly less manufactured goods across borders? Think that same Chinese economy can allow for a significant devaluation of U.S. sovereign debt? That’s their book, gang.
But China has finally come to the realization that the trade war is real and here to stay. Senior Chinese policymakers have referred to the trade war as part of a larger strategy of containment of Chinese ambitions that may lead to a new Cold War. They’re right.
Trump seems to relish the idea of bullying the Chinese in public. That’s certainly his style, but it’s also a risky strategy. To quote Sun Tzu: “Do not press a desperate foe too hard.”
China doesn’t like to be chastised publicly any more than anyone else, but culturally, saving-face may be more important to the Chinese. The Chinese are all about saving face and gaining face. That means they can walk away from a trade deal even if it damages them economically. Saving face is too important. But Trump is playing for keeps and will not back down either.
Unlike in other policy arenas, Trump has enjoyed bipartisan support in Congress. The Republicans have backed Trump from a national security perspective and the Democrats have backed him from a pro-labor perspective. China sees the handwriting on the wall.
This trade war will not end soon, because it’s part of something bigger and much more difficult to resolve. This is a struggle for hegemony in the 21st century. The trade war will be good for U.S. jobs but bad for global output. The stock market is going to wake up to this reality. The currency wars and trade wars are set to get worse.
Investors should prepare.
- Source, Jim Rickards
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