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Image | It’s High Time For Action
It’s High Time For Action
 PREVIEW
by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • Beware the coming reduction in global central bank money printing
  • The full-blown ecological emergency
  • Uncovering the hidden downside risks to the markets
  • Steps to take now

If you have not yet read Part 1: Are You Infuriated Yet?available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

I keep circling back to the financial markets because they are the chief signaling agent for most people. As long as the markets are doing okay, people’s attention wanders away from our predicaments and towards believing in the dominant "all is fine" narrative.

But, with the crystal-clear connection we see between asset prices and central bank money printing, prices in today's “markets” are really a creation of monetary policy. As a result, the signals the markets send us increasingly have no bearing on actual reality.

Here’s a good example: McDonalds' stock is hitting new high after new high. This is a function of both the ever-rising markets but also of the company's own internal accounting hocus-pocus.

This chart explains much:

(Source)

The red line tells us that MCD’s revenues are down a stunning 15% since 2014. The green line tells us that their stock price is UP an even more stunning 65% over the same time period.

Meanwhile total debt of MCD’s has mushroomed from $14 billion to $29 billion, while total assets have shrunk. Yet MCD's stock price has risen handsomely.

The critical insight this is telling us about today's markets is…

It’s High Time For Action
 PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • Beware the coming reduction in global central bank money printing
  • The full-blown ecological emergency
  • Uncovering the hidden downside risks to the markets
  • Steps to take now

If you have not yet read Part 1: Are You Infuriated Yet?available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

I keep circling back to the financial markets because they are the chief signaling agent for most people. As long as the markets are doing okay, people’s attention wanders away from our predicaments and towards believing in the dominant "all is fine" narrative.

But, with the crystal-clear connection we see between asset prices and central bank money printing, prices in today's “markets” are really a creation of monetary policy. As a result, the signals the markets send us increasingly have no bearing on actual reality.

Here’s a good example: McDonalds' stock is hitting new high after new high. This is a function of both the ever-rising markets but also of the company's own internal accounting hocus-pocus.

This chart explains much:

(Source)

The red line tells us that MCD’s revenues are down a stunning 15% since 2014. The green line tells us that their stock price is UP an even more stunning 65% over the same time period.

Meanwhile total debt of MCD’s has mushroomed from $14 billion to $29 billion, while total assets have shrunk. Yet MCD's stock price has risen handsomely.

The critical insight this is telling us about today's markets is…

Image | Signs Of Distress
Signs Of Distress
by Chris Martenson

The world is edging closer to the final moments after which everything will be forever changed.

Grand delusions, perpetuated over decades, will finally hit the limits of reality and collapse in on themselves.

We’re over-budget and have eaten deeply into the principal balances of all of our main trust accounts. We are ecologically overdrawn, financially insolvent, monetarily out past the Twilight Zone, consuming fossil fuels (as in literally eating them), and adding 80,000,000 net souls to the planet’s surface — each year! — without regard to the consequences.

Someday there will be hell to pay financially, economically, and ecologically as there simply isn’t any way to maintain these overdrafts forever. Reality does not renegotiate. Its deal terms aren't compromisable.
Signs Of Distress
 by Chris Martenson

The world is edging closer to the final moments after which everything will be forever changed.

Grand delusions, perpetuated over decades, will finally hit the limits of reality and collapse in on themselves.

We’re over-budget and have eaten deeply into the principal balances of all of our main trust accounts. We are ecologically overdrawn, financially insolvent, monetarily out past the Twilight Zone, consuming fossil fuels (as in literally eating them), and adding 80,000,000 net souls to the planet’s surface — each year! — without regard to the consequences.

Someday there will be hell to pay financially, economically, and ecologically as there simply isn’t any way to maintain these overdrafts forever. Reality does not renegotiate. Its deal terms aren't compromisable.
Image | Off The Cuff: The Path Forward
Off The Cuff: The Path Forward
 PREVIEW
by Adam Taggart

In this week's Off The Cuff podcast, Chris talks about:

  • Our Ecological Budget Is In The Red
    • Our short-sightedness is dooming us
  • Our Economic Budget Is In Similar Danger
    • Again, we are living way above our means
  • Politically, We're Stumbling Badly, Too
    • North Korea, Russia, Syria, domestically…the list is long
  • We Can Do Better
    • There are plenty of better models out there, if we look for them

Recording from vacation on a small island in Maine with no power, this is different than our standard Off The Cuff. Chris takes time to reflect on the repercussions of our poor policy choices and how those are manifesting in the world. What makes our mistakes so regrettable in his eyes is that there are clear ways to do things better — we don't need new magical solutions to appear; there are models that work right on the table, ready for use; if only we're bold enough to embrace change.

Click to listen to a sample of this Off the Cuff Podcast or Enroll today to access the full audio and other premium content today.
Off The Cuff: The Path Forward
 PREVIEW by Adam Taggart

In this week's Off The Cuff podcast, Chris talks about:

  • Our Ecological Budget Is In The Red
    • Our short-sightedness is dooming us
  • Our Economic Budget Is In Similar Danger
    • Again, we are living way above our means
  • Politically, We're Stumbling Badly, Too
    • North Korea, Russia, Syria, domestically…the list is long
  • We Can Do Better
    • There are plenty of better models out there, if we look for them

Recording from vacation on a small island in Maine with no power, this is different than our standard Off The Cuff. Chris takes time to reflect on the repercussions of our poor policy choices and how those are manifesting in the world. What makes our mistakes so regrettable in his eyes is that there are clear ways to do things better — we don't need new magical solutions to appear; there are models that work right on the table, ready for use; if only we're bold enough to embrace change.

Click to listen to a sample of this Off the Cuff Podcast or Enroll today to access the full audio and other premium content today.
Image | On Our Way To Freedom Fest
On Our Way To Freedom Fest
by Adam Taggart

For years now, a number of Peak Prosperity readers have been encouraging Chris and me to attend Freedom Fest, a conference billed as "The world's largest gathering of free minds". 

Every Spring, the calls and emails begin: Are you guys going to Freedom Fest this year?

They tell us this is consistently the most stimulating week of their entire year. And that, like at our annual seminars, the people you meet and relationships you make there are well worth the price of admission alone.

Well, this year we decided to take up the invitation.
On Our Way To Freedom Fest
 by Adam Taggart

For years now, a number of Peak Prosperity readers have been encouraging Chris and me to attend Freedom Fest, a conference billed as "The world's largest gathering of free minds". 

Every Spring, the calls and emails begin: Are you guys going to Freedom Fest this year?

They tell us this is consistently the most stimulating week of their entire year. And that, like at our annual seminars, the people you meet and relationships you make there are well worth the price of admission alone.

Well, this year we decided to take up the invitation.
Image | Kurt Cobb: Money Cannot Manufacture Resources
Kurt Cobb: Money Cannot Manufacture Resources
by Adam Taggart

Author Kurt Cobb writes frequently on energy and the environment and warns that our current economic policy suffers from a fatal degree of magical thinking: sufficient new resources will emerge if the price is high enough.
Kurt Cobb: Money Cannot Manufacture Resources
 by Adam Taggart

Author Kurt Cobb writes frequently on energy and the environment and warns that our current economic policy suffers from a fatal degree of magical thinking: sufficient new resources will emerge if the price is high enough.
Image | Life Beyond The Tipping Point
Life Beyond The Tipping Point
 PREVIEW
by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • There is not nearly enough net energy to meet our growth expectations in our lifetime
  • We are past the "tipping point". A hard rendezvous with limits to growth will arrive in the next 2 decades
  • What you can do to avoid that pain that the majority undoutedly will face
  • Prepare for the current "mother of all bubbles" to burst soon

If you have not yet read, In Denial: We Pursue Endless Growth At Our Peril available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

Energy Denial

It is said that you cannot explain water to a fish and I have nearly as difficult time trying to explain energy to people today. We are surrounded by it so completely it is difficult to properly appreciate.

But it is in every particle of food you eat, every piece of furniture in your house, every item you wear, and every trip you take — are all 100% dependent on energy that came from somewhere and subsidizes every single item and action.

Fossil fuels are the vast majority of all the energy we use and, it cannot be repeated enough, they visibly and invisibly subsidize the so-called renewables, too. By that I mean solar and wind power cannot be generated until and unless the components are first manufactured and installed. And those activities are nearly 100% driven by fossil fuels today.

To grasp this more fully, watch this time-lapse video of a wind tower being installed and, while marveling at the ingenuity and speed of the team involved, think about where all of the components came from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84BeVq2Jm88

How were the cranes, bulldozers and trucks built? What fuels do they run on? How did all those workers get there? Who grew their food and how did they come to eat it? How are the roads they drove on built and maintained? How is concrete made and how did it all get to the job site? What do the factories and foundries run on that built the windmill? How far did each windmill component have to travel before arriving at the site?

The answer to all of those questions is…

Life Beyond The Tipping Point
 PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • There is not nearly enough net energy to meet our growth expectations in our lifetime
  • We are past the "tipping point". A hard rendezvous with limits to growth will arrive in the next 2 decades
  • What you can do to avoid that pain that the majority undoutedly will face
  • Prepare for the current "mother of all bubbles" to burst soon

If you have not yet read, In Denial: We Pursue Endless Growth At Our Peril available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

Energy Denial

It is said that you cannot explain water to a fish and I have nearly as difficult time trying to explain energy to people today. We are surrounded by it so completely it is difficult to properly appreciate.

But it is in every particle of food you eat, every piece of furniture in your house, every item you wear, and every trip you take — are all 100% dependent on energy that came from somewhere and subsidizes every single item and action.

Fossil fuels are the vast majority of all the energy we use and, it cannot be repeated enough, they visibly and invisibly subsidize the so-called renewables, too. By that I mean solar and wind power cannot be generated until and unless the components are first manufactured and installed. And those activities are nearly 100% driven by fossil fuels today.

To grasp this more fully, watch this time-lapse video of a wind tower being installed and, while marveling at the ingenuity and speed of the team involved, think about where all of the components came from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84BeVq2Jm88

How were the cranes, bulldozers and trucks built? What fuels do they run on? How did all those workers get there? Who grew their food and how did they come to eat it? How are the roads they drove on built and maintained? How is concrete made and how did it all get to the job site? What do the factories and foundries run on that built the windmill? How far did each windmill component have to travel before arriving at the site?

The answer to all of those questions is…

Image | Ocean Acidification: An Ecological Nightmare
Ocean Acidification: An Ecological Nightmare
 PREVIEW
by Chris Martenson

The oceans are facing numerous difficulties including pollution (especially from farm run off), over-fishing, and dragnet methods that ruin innumerable other things besides the targeted catch — but all of that pales in comparison to the problem of ocean acidification.
Ocean Acidification: An Ecological Nightmare
 PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

The oceans are facing numerous difficulties including pollution (especially from farm run off), over-fishing, and dragnet methods that ruin innumerable other things besides the targeted catch — but all of that pales in comparison to the problem of ocean acidification.
Image | A Tough Winter
A Tough Winter
 PREVIEW
by Chris Martenson

Last year we had the ‘polar vortex’ which delivered some of the absolute coldest air to our region, so the back-to-back experience is one of relentless cold, snowy winters and short summers.

Similarly, there seem to be a bunch of new economic rules that we have to adjust our thinking around.

 
A Tough Winter
 PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Last year we had the ‘polar vortex’ which delivered some of the absolute coldest air to our region, so the back-to-back experience is one of relentless cold, snowy winters and short summers.

Similarly, there seem to be a bunch of new economic rules that we have to adjust our thinking around.

 
Image | Ready Or Not…
Ready Or Not…
by Chris Martenson

If risk has been taken from where it belongs and instead shuffled onto central bank balance sheets, or allowed to be hidden by new and accommodating accounting tricks, has it really disappeared? In my world, risk is like energy: it can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred. 

If reality no longer has a place at the table — such as when policy makers act as if the all-too-temporary shale oil bonanza is now a new permanent constant — then the discussions happening around that table are only accidentally useful, if ever, and always delusional.
Ready Or Not…
 by Chris Martenson

If risk has been taken from where it belongs and instead shuffled onto central bank balance sheets, or allowed to be hidden by new and accommodating accounting tricks, has it really disappeared? In my world, risk is like energy: it can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed or transferred. 

If reality no longer has a place at the table — such as when policy makers act as if the all-too-temporary shale oil bonanza is now a new permanent constant — then the discussions happening around that table are only accidentally useful, if ever, and always delusional.
Image | The 3 Likeliest Ways Things Will Play Out From Here
The 3 Likeliest Ways Things Will Play Out From Here
 PREVIEW
by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • The wisdom and value of scenario planning
  • Scenario #1: A Slow Burn
  • Scenario #2: Fragmentation
  • Scenario #3: A Hard Landing
  • The prudence of taking individual action now, vs depending upon "the system" to react to future events

If you have not yet read Part 1: Ready Or Not… available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

It all begins with the clear-eyed recognition that the old way of doing business is clearly unsustainable. And yet knowing that the various governmental and institutional powerbrokers are doing everything they can to perpetuate the status quo way of doing business.

Business-as-usual is literally going to end in some flavor of disaster, and yet we collectively adhere to it, even when the end-point is as obvious as calculating the linear rate of withdrawal of water from a non-renewing aquifer.

But there's nothing linear about the nested and/or intertwined complex systems we call the Economy, the Environment and Energy.  Each of these is independently complex, meaning they often easily defy the attempts to manage them. And they are utterly unpredictable for anything longer than the immediate term.

For example, of the three, Energy seems the simplest, and it is.  But even there, we note that the amount of energy that can and will be extracted is a function of the price of energy, available technology and skills, capital available for investment, and what's actually down there in the earth to be pulled up.  In that list, several factors are courtesy of the Economy, which is itself dependent on Energy. A glitch in one can feedback rapidly to create a glitch in the other.

Given all of this complexity, one good way to get a handle on things is to identify the scenarios we deem to be most likely given all available evidence, and then assign probabilities to each. Asking ourselves, What can we today to prepare for Scenario X? then allows us to begin constructing action plans to mitigate our vulnerability, and even better in cases, position ourselves to prosper as the future unfolds. 

Scenario #1:  A Slow Burn

In 2008, the practice of borrowing too much caught up with the developed world and a serious financial crisis threatened to take down the entire financial system.  Indeed, according to after-action reports from Hank Paulson (then Treasury Secretary) and Mervyn King (then BoE chairman), the world came within mere hours of a full-blown global banking system meltdown…

The 3 Likeliest Ways Things Will Play Out From Here
 PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • The wisdom and value of scenario planning
  • Scenario #1: A Slow Burn
  • Scenario #2: Fragmentation
  • Scenario #3: A Hard Landing
  • The prudence of taking individual action now, vs depending upon "the system" to react to future events

If you have not yet read Part 1: Ready Or Not… available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

It all begins with the clear-eyed recognition that the old way of doing business is clearly unsustainable. And yet knowing that the various governmental and institutional powerbrokers are doing everything they can to perpetuate the status quo way of doing business.

Business-as-usual is literally going to end in some flavor of disaster, and yet we collectively adhere to it, even when the end-point is as obvious as calculating the linear rate of withdrawal of water from a non-renewing aquifer.

But there's nothing linear about the nested and/or intertwined complex systems we call the Economy, the Environment and Energy.  Each of these is independently complex, meaning they often easily defy the attempts to manage them. And they are utterly unpredictable for anything longer than the immediate term.

For example, of the three, Energy seems the simplest, and it is.  But even there, we note that the amount of energy that can and will be extracted is a function of the price of energy, available technology and skills, capital available for investment, and what's actually down there in the earth to be pulled up.  In that list, several factors are courtesy of the Economy, which is itself dependent on Energy. A glitch in one can feedback rapidly to create a glitch in the other.

Given all of this complexity, one good way to get a handle on things is to identify the scenarios we deem to be most likely given all available evidence, and then assign probabilities to each. Asking ourselves, What can we today to prepare for Scenario X? then allows us to begin constructing action plans to mitigate our vulnerability, and even better in cases, position ourselves to prosper as the future unfolds. 

Scenario #1:  A Slow Burn

In 2008, the practice of borrowing too much caught up with the developed world and a serious financial crisis threatened to take down the entire financial system.  Indeed, according to after-action reports from Hank Paulson (then Treasury Secretary) and Mervyn King (then BoE chairman), the world came within mere hours of a full-blown global banking system meltdown…

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