They are playing us. Almost everything in our news cycle is questionable. The lines between fact and fiction have become blurred. What our leaders and mainstream media peddle as the truth is often misinformation… and what is really the truth is smeared as misinformation. Furthermore, attention spans have narrowed so significantly that even when the truth is hard to cover up, the populace can be distracted with a barrage of information unrelated to the problematic topic. Who, for example, still asks the question: where is Epstein’s client list? It’s only a few weeks now since Trump was shot at and few care any longer.

In this never ending exhausting stream of “information,” the brain tires and the default of emotions rises with logic taking a back door. It’s far easier to be emotional than logical. This plays into the hands of, in particular, our “elites” masquerading their greed as virtue.

Reality has been replaced by false messaging and imagery to such an extent that one cannot distinguish between fact and fiction. And as a result of this, everyone squabbles through the prism of their own confirmation biases and ideological impulses.

We are ruled by a nefarious group of individuals that have an unquenchable thirst for power, control, and money. They don’t care what they have to do to get it — and that includes tricking people into thinking they are the virtuous good guys who are here to keep us all safe. And tragically, millions of people are completely duped by this. What we have witnessed over the COVID response, the war in Ukraine, the Net-Zero agenda on climate change, and many other current issues is a movement of faux virtue that has been carefully crafted by corrupt politicians, messengers within legacy media outlets, greedy corporations, messiah delusional billionaires, and undemocratic technocrats to create the impression that they are the virtuous ones who are our friends.

These people are not our friends. Their primary objective is to hoodwink us into believing and complying to their virtue, but in reality, being tricked into giving away more freedoms, power, wealth, and assets to these virtue vultures.

The reality of all of this is that we are sleepwalking towards the biggest asset grab in the history of the planet. They are trying to destroy farms, land, businesses, freedoms, housing, individual wealth, travel, and own them or sell them off to the highest bidder. And at the same time, they are trying to ring-fence society into the entrapment of being controlled by data — either through health passports or the slow mission creep towards central banking digital currencies (CBDCs). It’s a giant asset grab of what we own and control. Of course, they frame all of this being in our best interests. But make no mistake — it’s the biggest swindle ever.

This gargantuan virtue con-trick also comes with a huge slice of authoritarianism. Anyone who sees through it, questions it, stands up to it, or shows opposition to it are immediately ridiculed and ostracised by the group-think mob.

• Question the COVID response? You’re a “Covidiot.”
• Question the Ukraine war? Bugger off, you Putin apologist, you.
• Question Net-Zero? You must be a far right climate change denier!

This is gutter politics designed to shut down and undermine any opposition or questioning. It works if you allow them to emotionally engage you. Don’t fall for it! But not questioning the narrative is a huge form of denial. Because any government, technocrat, or institution that advocates medical discrimination, suppression of civil liberties and a transfer of wealth and public assets to the rich while the rest of society endures a cost of living crisis is not your friend.

Don’t be fooled by their virtue. It’s a giant con! In reality, they are indulging in a massive asset grab. They are treating the world as feudalism, but under the guise of “it’s for your own good” or “safety” faux virtue. A Machiavellian weapon that power hungry sociopaths use for control.

Fake virtue peddled by governments and authorities for mass compliance and social control is the oldest trick in the authoritarian playbook. Don’t fall for it. Because when totalitarianism arrives, it will come cloaked in fake virtue.

And now we have not only Venezuela, but Bangladesh, too, and this brings me to US foreign policy, which is a giant Ponzi scheme.

A Ponzi Scheme

Here’s how it works in six steps…

• Buy foreign leaders who are willing to sell out their people and grant cheap resources/labour to the Empire.
• If leaders refuse, sanction them and stoke political discontent, murdering thousands.
• Use the result of crushing sanctions as “proof” their regimes are bad for their people.Fund fascist “revolutions” again and again and again, until a new leader emerges who will sell out their people to the Empire.
• In the meantime, this is funded by taxpayers in the Empire. Additionally, these parasites will take videos and photos of the dying impoverished people who are dying and being impoverished by the actions of these parasites… and beg you for charity to help these unfortunate people.
• Instigate proxy wars when any of the above doesn’t work. These proxy wars cause refugee crises flooding Western countries, which destroys the homogeneity of nation states, making them weaker.

It is nothing but a hollow, superficial crime gang masquerading as a society that only cares about one thing: perpetually increasing its power and wealth, at the expense of all else.

International Man’s Note: The Western system is undergoing substantial changes, and the signs of moral decay, corruption, and increasing debt are impossible to ignore. With the Great Reset in motion, the United Nations, World Economic Forum, IMF, WHO, World Bank, and Davos man are all promoting a unified agenda that will affect us all.

To get ahead of the chaos, download our free PDF report “Clash of the Systems: Thoughts on Investing at a Unique Point in Time” by clicking here.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. The Brits? Ok, these are the same people who think Spam is cuisine, and that was AFTER ruling much of the world. Can you imagine walking into a ridiculously well stocked buffet hall with every imaginable cuisine available to you — Argentinian asado, Thai coconut curries, sushi, lasagna, garlic prawns — and you say, “No, I’ll have the Spam and beans, thanks.” So I’m going to just put the Brits and their decision making capabilities into the “questionable” bucket.

The same for the Ozzies. Why? Easy. These are the same people who choose to live with eight of the world’s 10 most dangerous animals, and I’m not even counting the politicians, so… But this is clearly a rollout. The coordination has all the hallmarks of the COVID scam rollout. And look, it’s all the same players. Next up Canada and New Zealand. I’d bet Nancy Pelosi’s stock portfolio on it.

From Newsweek article:

The commander of the Dutch army on Thursday called on the Netherlands to become better prepared for a potential future war with Russia.

“The Netherlands should be seriously afraid of war, and our society should prepare for it…Russia is getting stronger, ” Lieutenant General Martin Wijnen, commander of the Royal Netherlands Army, said in an interview with the newspaper De Telegraaf.

It’s the same method they used with COVID. Begin by terrorizing the people, point to the problem, and provide a “solution”. If we are to meet the goals of the WEF (clearly and in repeated ways being population reduction), then what better way to get there than war. Ukraine was the pilot project. Clearly, it’s not about winning. That was never going to happen, and sadly the military industrial complex knew this. It is nothing to these psychopaths that over a million Ukrainians are dead, and they’re now apparently looking to call up women. You know, equality and all that. Gender is a spectrum, right?

We have also previously highlighted that the Ozzies and Kiwis will be the pointy end of the Western stick used to poke the hornet’s nest. And here we go… A yahoo news article points to this:

As Australia and its allies continue to warily watch China’s growing influence campaign in the Pacific, New Zealand has inched closer to joining the AUKUS pact and working towards more “seamless” military operations with Australia.

“We are better together than we are apart,” New Zealand Defence Minister Judith Collins said.

The move towards working in lockstep is being put into place now (kinda like COVID lockdowns, really. Funny that!):

Australia Defence Minister Richard Marles said there would be”increasing integration between our military forces, including through common capability, exchanges of senior military officers and increased participation in war-fighting exercises”.

I expect the warmongering to begin in earnest shortly.

But remember this, folks. All wars are bankers’ wars, and the bankers have decided we’re going to war. Now the podium donuts (politicians) will be brought in to play their part and the MSM propaganda machines will turn on the never ending ceaseless “[insert Russia, China, Iran, etc.] bad” narrative. But to really get the populace behind them, we can expect a false flag or two. They will need to get the people to fear for their lives. Only then will they fully commit to sending their sons and daughters into the meat grinder.

Editor’s Note: The Western system is undergoing substantial changes, and the signs of moral decay, corruption, and increasing debt are impossible to ignore. With the Great Reset in motion, the United Nations, World Economic Forum, IMF, WHO, World Bank, and Davos man are all promoting a unified agenda that will affect us all.

To get ahead of the chaos, download our free PDF report “Clash of the Systems: Thoughts on Investing at a Unique Point in Time” by clicking here.

Captive in the so-called 15-minute cities, eat bugs and no meat, immerse in the metaverse, and a never ending feed of pharmaceuticals, and all that by force, otherwise your universal basic income (UBI) gets cut off.

Energy? Dirty.

Lower motorway speeds and driving ban in plan to tackle oil reliance. Here’s an extract from Daily Echo article

Lowering motorway speed limits and introducing driving bans on Sunday are ideas being suggested to cut Britain’s reliance on oil.

The ideas are part of a ten-point plan proposed by the International Energy Agency in a bid to reduce global oil demand by 2.7 million barrels per day.

Motorway speed limits would be reduced by 6 mph across the country under the proposals, while the plan also suggests a ban on driving in cities every Sunday.

This is horseshit! It has nothing to do with “reducing reliance on oil” and everything to do with the WEF and UN “sustainable development Agenda 2030.”

You know what’s going to happen? The existing stream of folks leaving countries implementing these policies will turn into a flood (more on this in a minute). With it will come capital controls, because the sociopaths driving this agenda will never see their own policies as the problem. No, it’s always those silly peasants who are the problem.

In case you’re wondering… that’s you.

Meat? Dirty.

Irish considering massive cattle culling. We are flabbergasted that killing 200,000 head of cattle is even a consideration…

Wasn’t Ireland “famous” for its potato famine? You would think that people would learn from history. I am coming to the view that little/nothing is learnt by studying history.

When will folks wake up to this delusional stuff going on? Perhaps when their living standards take a bat to the knees.

In any event, the Irish merely considering the elimination of 10% of their cattle herd highlights just how strong this climate narrative is. But it’s not solely an Irish issue. This cancer has spread to all of the West.

Upcoming Steak Prohibition.

German authorities have advised residents of Germany to consume no more than 10 grams of meat per day, as discussed in an article published by Eastern Herald

The black market trade in steaks is going to be absolutely loco. When they told us we’d eat the bugs, they didn’t mention the word “willingly.”

Here’s how it works in case you’ve not figured it out or if you need to explain things to friends who have perhaps thus far been gullible enough to buy into the entire “the world is going through a climate crisis” and life itself will end in [pick your suitable date]” hogwash.

The financial considerations that need to be made in order to meet idiotic green energy targets mean that all things that currently sustain life itself (energy and food being at the top of the list) become uneconomical and are shut down.

This is creating the greatest convexity I’ve ever seen in my career. In fact, it is the greatest I’ve ever seen relative to my readings of history going back hundreds of years. What is obvious is the sectors coming under attack. What is more challenging is determining from an investment standpoint the jurisdictions/countries which will ultimately repudiate this Malthusian genocidal eugenic agenda.

More lies regarding the “renewable energy transition”.

We need ‘+330 mines in 12 years’ to feed battery demand according to Stockhead.

Yeah, it ain’t gonna happen. Simple math, which a 10-year-old should be able to do, reveals that this entire charade is not only going to fall short. It is not going to come anywhere near close, which begs the question: what is it that is planned?

The answer is that the sociopaths at the UN and in Washington have no real intent for the peasants to continue with their current standard of living. They intend for us all to live in our 15-minute cities, eating bugs, immersed in the metaverse, and hooked up to a neverending feed of pharmaceuticals, which we’ll be forced to take, otherwise your UBI (universal basic income) gets cut off.

That is their plan, and it is currently under implementation. It is surprisingly successful. The pushback is rather mediocre, and that is more easily understood by the 4th Turning. By and large, the West is in a fourth turning. People are fat, well fed, lazy physically and intellectually. Unprepared to sacrifice their relative comforts, they will be largely sacrificed. The next generation will have to come out stronger. This may happen in some places. We can certainly hope so. What is also possible and not discussed much is that a long dark age could take hold. Certainly it’s happened before.

What I do know is that nothing happens in a vacuum… and we are seeing this. The weakening of the entire Western middle class is being met with both emigration of the awake and typically wealthy class to pockets which are benefitting from the collapse.

Article cross-posted from International Man.

Gold in SGD, AUD, EUR, CNH, JPY indexed to 100 – year-to-date

And it seems to have been working off an overbought condition over the last couple of years. If this was a flash in the pan thing for gold, it should have given back all its gains of 2020 on the back of Covid (as the Nasdaq has). Also note gold was already moving higher in 2019 way before Covid.

So it would seem to us that the COVID scam and the recent banking crisis/circus is just “fleas on a dog’s back” for gold — there is something “systemic” going on. The lack of trust on a global scale is revealing itself in gold.

We have a strong conviction that this is the tip of the iceberg (i.e. the upside of gold in multi-currency terms is a long way from being done).

Long term it would seem that the odds are in favor of gold outperforming the world stock market.

I know there is a lot to take in, and I’m going to show you yet another chart, but this is truly revealing.

Gold in SGD, AUD, EUR, CNH, JPY indexed to 100 – last 20 years

This takes us back to 2000 — 20-odd years ago. Multi currencies against the yellow metal indexed to zero. Is this not monetary debasement in a simple picture?

Obviously, it depends on where you take your time period from, but from 1990 the world stock market is up some 380% whereas gold is up 450%. So it could be argued that all the gains in the world stock market have been on the back of monetary debasement.

There is one key thing we left out in the chart above — the effect of compounding dividends. If we include dividends and assume they are reinvested, then the return of the world stock market goes to 710%, but around half of those returns are accounted for by monetary debasement.

Our thinking is that, longer-term (a 10-year view), holding a “whack” of your money in gold (physical or an ETF) in preference to the general equity market (or other growth orientated ETFs) isn’t a stupid idea and is actually a no brainer.

Are we on the verge of massive outperformance of gold relative to the S&P? Like the 1970s or even from 2000 to 2013? Well, stranger things have happened. Note that when gold gets going, the trends tend not to last for just a couple of years but rather 10 years at least.

Here is where things are far from being a no-brainer… What is going to outperform over the next 10 years or so? Gold or gold miners?

From 1983 to 2008, gold and gold miners tracked each other reasonably well. Then, from mid-2008 (the onset of the GFC), something happened and gold has outperformed miners dramatically. Sorry, but 1983 is as far back as the XAU (Philadelphia Gold Miners Index) goes.

Gold miners (XAU) and gold spot indexed to 1 as of 1983

Zooming into the period from mid-2008 until present, we can see in the chart below that gold miners have underperformed gold by some 70%, although they have moved in lockstep since the start of 2015 (eight years).

What is the reason for this underperformance?

Some say it is because of the increase in costs from energy. Yet, from 2008 until present, crude (a good proxy for diesel prices) has gone down relative to gold.

The contrarian in us suggests that we are approaching a time for gold miners to outperform gold. But we are lacking a fundamental reason for that genius idea.

Stacking up relative to the S&P 500 we can see in the chart below that the gold miners have performed more or less in line with the S&P 500 since the start of 2015.

And gold miners are as out of favor as they were during the height of the TMT/dot-com bubble of 2000.

In a nutshell:

• We don’t think it is going to be difficult to outperform the S&P 500 with a basket of gold miners over the next 10 years
• Whether or not you would be better off investing in gold miners or gold, toss a coin… or go 50/50 GDX and GLD — Newmont and Krugerrand or whatever tickles your fancy.

What else?

Is gold foretelling us of an impending monetary crisis?

Well, we do know one’s coming so…

Editor’s Note: The Western system is undergoing substantial changes, and the signs of moral decay, corruption, and increasing debt are impossible to ignore. With the Great Reset in motion, the United Nations, World Economic Forum, IMF, WHO, World Bank, and Davos man are all promoting a unified agenda that will affect us all.

To get ahead of the chaos, download our free PDF report “Clash of the Systems: Thoughts on Investing at a Unique Point in Time” by clicking here. Article cross-posted from International Man.

For a moment, it looked like anyone with over $250,000 in the bank would lose their money. Apparently more than 90% of deposits at SVB exceeded this figure. That was the situation until the Fed came in and bailed everyone out over the weekend.

A timely reminder that money in the bank is NOT YOURS.

You are an unsecured creditor in what may very well be an insolvent institution. Some countries don’t even have deposit insurance, and every penny can be taken.

Meanwhile, here’s a live shot of me surveying my gold hoard (very little in banks):

In all seriousness, the issue here for SVB is actually with bonds.

Jamie Quint explained this on Twitter:

– In 2021 SVB saw a mass influx in deposits, which jumped from $61.76bn at the end of 2019 to $189.20bn at the end of 2021.

– As deposits grew, SVB could not grow their loan book fast enough to generate the yield they wanted to see on this capital. As a result, they purchased a large amount (over $80bn!) in mortgage backed securities (MBS) with these deposits for their hold-to-maturity (HTM) portfolio.

– 97% of these MBS were 10+ year duration, with a weighted average yield of 1.56%.

– The issue is that as the Fed raised interest rates in 2022 and continued to do so through 2023, the value of SVB’s MBS plummeted. This is because investors can now purchase long-duration “risk-free” bonds from the Fed at a 2.5x higher yield.

– This is not a liquidity issue as long as SVB maintains their deposits, since these securities will pay out more than they cost eventually.

– However, yesterday afternoon, SVB announced that they had sold $21bn of their Available For Sale (AFS) securities at a $1.8bn loss, and were raising another $2.25bn in equity and debt. This came as a surprise to investors, who were under the impression that SVB had enough liquidity to avoid selling their AFS portfolio.

Basically, SVB made a fixed income investment, rates moved higher, decimating the value of those bonds and now their collateral base is crappy. They’d need to sell assets to shore up their balance sheet, call in loans, raise equity, or all of the above — none of which is accretive and all of which may in itself call into question the solvency of the bank. Well, as it turns out, they waited too long to do any of that to try to fix things. And now they’re gone.

As we’ve been saying for years now, the unwinding of the bond market is going to create all manner of problems, many of which we’ve not even thought about. Anyone who is long bond duration is going to get hammered. The knock on effects promise to be substantial.

What to look out for? Banks, Insurances and Pension Funds.

Banks, insurance companies, and pension funds all own long-term paper at extremely low interest rates. Increasingly, they’ll be forced to compete with short-term treasuries, and they’ll lose. This is without them marking to market their balance sheets, which will come under enormous pressure. Consider a bond bought with a 1.25% coupon. When that same bond yields a mere 2.5%, the value of the bond gets cut in HALF. That’s a problem as all three of the above institutions will be forced to do one or all of the following in order to meet capital adequacy ratios:

1. Raise equity capital, which is dilutive and will be taking place in an environment of risk aversion. Ouch!
2. Liquidate some portion of their book in order to bring things back into line. Calling in loans in the midst of a market that is “risk off” means liquidity is poor or poorer than previously thought and prices crater quickly, especially with illiquid assets (think real estate, private equity, and so forth).
3. Seek a saviour from a better capitalised competitor in order to stay alive. Naturally, any transaction like this will be done on terms rather favourable to the acquirer. Call it distressed debt investing.

But what retail does? Buy more of those.

Remember, retail investors have no idea about any of the above. All they see is headlines on the nightly news and they freak out. This is why “managing the press” is so important to the powers that be. If not “managed,” we see mass withdrawals from depositors seeking higher yields which itself results in a wave of bank failures and that itself results in further withdrawals. Did I mention you may want to hold some gold?

In any event, the market sensing risk immediately sold the banks. All of them.

To be fair, every major index was down. The Dow, the Spooz, Nasdaq — all of them.

We don’t particularly care since we’re not invested in banks. With respect to the indices, we’re not invested in these either. This doesn’t mean however that we couldn’t see some headwinds as a liquidity crisis could cause problems for all and sundry here.

Interestingly that “useless lump of rock” took a few blue pills and got a rise.

The Coming Implosion

Give it 12 months or less, as the venture capitalists’ books are going to begin to be forced to mark-to-market their positions is going to be epic. I say they’re going to be forced to do this because most VC funded firms have 12 months of runway, and pray tell, who’s going to keep lending money to mostly (not all mind) cash incinerating Silicon Valley startups? So start your stopwatches and let’s clock back in 12 months from now or so (probably less).

Take a look at this Joint Statement by Treasury, Federal Reserve, and FDIC

The following statement was released by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen, Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome H. Powell, and FDIC Chairman Martin J. Gruenberg:

Today we are taking decisive actions to protect the U.S. economy by strengthening public confidence in our banking system. This step will ensure that the U.S. banking system continues to perform its vital roles of protecting deposits and providing access to credit to households and businesses in a manner that promotes strong and sustainable economic growth.

After receiving a recommendation from the boards of the FDIC and the Federal Reserve, and consulting with the President, Secretary Yellen approved actions enabling the FDIC to complete its resolution of Silicon Valley Bank, Santa Clara, California, in a manner that fully protects all depositors. Depositors will have access to all of their money starting Monday, March 13. No losses associated with the resolution of Silicon Valley Bank will be borne by the taxpayer.

We are also announcing a similar systemic risk exception for Signature Bank, New York, New York, which was closed today by its state chartering authority. All depositors of this institution will be made whole. As with the resolution of Silicon Valley Bank, no losses will be borne by the taxpayer.

Shareholders and certain unsecured debtholders will not be protected. Senior management has also been removed. Any losses to the Deposit Insurance Fund to support uninsured depositors will be recovered by a special assessment on banks, as required by law.

Finally, the Federal Reserve Board on Sunday announced it will make available additional funding to eligible depository institutions to help assure banks have the ability to meet the needs of all their depositors.

The U.S. banking system remains resilient and on a solid foundation, in large part due to reforms that were made after the financial crisis that ensured better safeguards for the banking industry. Those reforms combined with today’s actions demonstrate our commitment to take the necessary steps to ensure that depositors’ savings remain safe.

Imagine being a conservative bank that did the right thing. You now pay for the folly of your competitors who completely pha-cdup. Communism.

The little midget woman assured everyone that this is NOT a bailout. So there’s that.

SVB is a warning sign not an isolated event.

It is a function of the risks that are out there. Anyone with long duration fixed income assets bought anywhere from 2008 onwards is holding increasingly worthless paper. The ramifications of this will be profound.

What nobody is talking about, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out why, is that this has implications on the international front. Imagine, for a moment, you’re China. You see all this going down. You realize that the Fed can’t “tame inflation” while simultaneously bailing out the banks. It’s one or the other, and they’ve just announced they’ll bail out the banks. It is worth remembering China holds roughly a trillion in US debt.

Now, add to that the neocons threatening war with China, and you can see that there is a non zero risk that China tries to get out of the kitchen first and sells their US bonds. I know that’s what I’d do.

For whatever is worth, my favorite bank in this environment is something akin to Gringotts.

International Man’s Note: The Western system is undergoing substantial changes, and the signs of moral decay, corruption, and increasing debt are impossible to ignore. With the Great Reset in motion, the United Nations, World Economic Forum, IMF, WHO, World Bank, and Davos man are all promoting a unified agenda that will affect us all.

To get ahead of the chaos, download our free PDF report “Clash of the Systems: Thoughts on Investing at a Unique Point in Time” by clicking here.

Article cross-posted from International Man.