page-loading-spinner

Greece

by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • Which countries are next in line to "go Greek"?
  • Which major countries will be hit by deflation next? Which will instead see massive inflation?
  • How individuals should start preparing
  • Why huge massive losses and wealth transfer are inevitable for many

If you have not yet read Part 1: Greece Exposes The Global Economy's Achilles Heel, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

At a high level, the suite of predicaments we face are as obvious as they are serious. 

Perhaps the largest predicament we face is that infinite economic growth on a finite planet is an impossibility and yet that's exactly what our monetary and banking systems require.

Not merely because the bankers and politicians want it, which they do, but because that's how the system itself is designed.  When you loan money into existence, you get an exponential increase of that money over time.  Actually you get an exponential increase in debt too, only at a faster pace which translates into larger quantities.

For as long as debts are growing at an exponential pace, everything is fine with the world, the economy hums along, politicians get re-elected and the big banks churn out profits year after year.

However, when the debt growth stops, financial panic sets in, the banking system threatens collapse, and the fiscal and monetary authorities pull out all the stops in their efforts to prevent these various ills from getting any worse.

What the political and banking folks are desperately seeking to prevent is nothing less than a Great Unraveling.

Their task is impossible.

The Great Unraveling will be a set of related economic and financial crises that end up taking inflated expectations and reducing them to match reality.  Perhaps this process will take years, or maybe it will take decades, or maybe it will take months.  Nobody knows.  But the longer that…

The Approaching Great Unraveling – Are You Prepared?
PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • Which countries are next in line to "go Greek"?
  • Which major countries will be hit by deflation next? Which will instead see massive inflation?
  • How individuals should start preparing
  • Why huge massive losses and wealth transfer are inevitable for many

If you have not yet read Part 1: Greece Exposes The Global Economy's Achilles Heel, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

At a high level, the suite of predicaments we face are as obvious as they are serious. 

Perhaps the largest predicament we face is that infinite economic growth on a finite planet is an impossibility and yet that's exactly what our monetary and banking systems require.

Not merely because the bankers and politicians want it, which they do, but because that's how the system itself is designed.  When you loan money into existence, you get an exponential increase of that money over time.  Actually you get an exponential increase in debt too, only at a faster pace which translates into larger quantities.

For as long as debts are growing at an exponential pace, everything is fine with the world, the economy hums along, politicians get re-elected and the big banks churn out profits year after year.

However, when the debt growth stops, financial panic sets in, the banking system threatens collapse, and the fiscal and monetary authorities pull out all the stops in their efforts to prevent these various ills from getting any worse.

What the political and banking folks are desperately seeking to prevent is nothing less than a Great Unraveling.

Their task is impossible.

The Great Unraveling will be a set of related economic and financial crises that end up taking inflated expectations and reducing them to match reality.  Perhaps this process will take years, or maybe it will take decades, or maybe it will take months.  Nobody knows.  But the longer that…

by charleshughsmith

In my previous series on the erosion of community, I surveyed a number of conventional explanations for this decades-long trend and discussed 10 other potential factors in the decline of social capital. I concluded that economic need would likely be the driver of a resurgence of community—a need that will only become apparent when the Central State and the debt-based, consumerist-corporate system are no longer able to fulfill their implicit promises of welfare, subsidies, endless credit and secure jobs. In this next installment on community, we look at the possibility that new models are arising beneath the mainstream media’s master narratives that Everything’s fine and The Status Quo is both good and eternal.

The Rise of New Models of Community
by charleshughsmith

In my previous series on the erosion of community, I surveyed a number of conventional explanations for this decades-long trend and discussed 10 other potential factors in the decline of social capital. I concluded that economic need would likely be the driver of a resurgence of community—a need that will only become apparent when the Central State and the debt-based, consumerist-corporate system are no longer able to fulfill their implicit promises of welfare, subsidies, endless credit and secure jobs. In this next installment on community, we look at the possibility that new models are arising beneath the mainstream media’s master narratives that Everything’s fine and The Status Quo is both good and eternal.

by Chris Martenson

For years we've preached the From the Outside In principle of markets: When trouble starts, it nearly always does so out in the weaker periphery before creeping towards the core.

We saw this in the run-up to the housing bubble collapse, as sub-prime mortgages gave way before prime loans, and in Europe, as smaller economies like Greece, Ireland, and Cyprus have fallen first and hardest (so far).  We see this today in accelerating food stamp use among poorer U.S. households.  In each case, the weaker economic parties give way first before being followed, over time, by the stronger ones.

Using this framework, we can often get several weeks to several months of advance notice before trouble erupts in the next ring closer to the center.

Which makes today notable, as we're receiving a number of new warning signs.  The periphery is giving way.

The Periphery is Failing
by Chris Martenson

For years we've preached the From the Outside In principle of markets: When trouble starts, it nearly always does so out in the weaker periphery before creeping towards the core.

We saw this in the run-up to the housing bubble collapse, as sub-prime mortgages gave way before prime loans, and in Europe, as smaller economies like Greece, Ireland, and Cyprus have fallen first and hardest (so far).  We see this today in accelerating food stamp use among poorer U.S. households.  In each case, the weaker economic parties give way first before being followed, over time, by the stronger ones.

Using this framework, we can often get several weeks to several months of advance notice before trouble erupts in the next ring closer to the center.

Which makes today notable, as we're receiving a number of new warning signs.  The periphery is giving way.

by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • The current gold slam has *nothing* to do with the fundamentals for precious metals, which are very favorable right now
  • How bad would deflation be?
  • Evidence that deflation is arriving
  • Why our current monetary system has become so compromised by the banks
  • How to best protect your wealth from both deflation and the banks

If you have not yet read Part I: This Gold Slam is a Massive Wealth Transfer from Our Pockets to the Banks, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

About Those Wealth Transfers

The biggest news of the recent past is the flow of gold from West to East. 

 src=

(Source)

With China importing 835 tonnes of gold in 2012 that we know about (and they may well be doing more under the table for official purposes) and also standing as the number one producer of gold, with ~360 tonnes of domestic production, none of which is exported, China is consuming at least 44% of total yearly world gold production.

Connect that with India importing between 200 and 300 tons per quarter (2011 imports were 967 tonnes, and 2012 was 864 tonnes), and this represents another 33% of total world mine output.  Add in Russia buying more official gold, and you suddenly find that a commanding proportion of the newly mined gold in the world is headed East, where it used to stay largely in the West.

To be clear, I view gold as money and therefore wealth itself.  Everything else that can be manufactured out of thin air is merely a claim on wealth.  In these terms, the West is slowly but steadily bleeding control of wealth to the East, something I thought our leaders were both aware of and focused on.

Knowing the lower prices will only exacerbate this West-to-East flow, I therefore thought that the bullion banks and central banks would not have dared push that dynamic any further.   But apparently no, obviously I was wrong, which pains me on several levels.

Add to this the various things going on in the world today, and I honestly thought we were in the most gold-favorable landscape of my life.

Consider:

  • Negative real interest rates (powerfully gold- and commodity-friendly throughout history)
  • North Korea threatening nuclear and conventional war
  • Open confiscation of wealth in Europe from bank accounts
  • Japan doubling their monetary base in a brazenly desperate bid to stoke inflation by attacking Japanese trust in their own currency
  • Extremely unfavorable bond yields up and down the yield ladder
  • Continued European stress and discord with the possibility of a Eurozone disintegration

Taken together, this level of system, sovereign, and institutional uncertainty is about as gold-friendly a situation one could concoct…

Protecting Your Wealth from Deflation
PREVIEW by Chris Martenson

Executive Summary

  • The current gold slam has *nothing* to do with the fundamentals for precious metals, which are very favorable right now
  • How bad would deflation be?
  • Evidence that deflation is arriving
  • Why our current monetary system has become so compromised by the banks
  • How to best protect your wealth from both deflation and the banks

If you have not yet read Part I: This Gold Slam is a Massive Wealth Transfer from Our Pockets to the Banks, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.

About Those Wealth Transfers

The biggest news of the recent past is the flow of gold from West to East. 

 src=

(Source)

With China importing 835 tonnes of gold in 2012 that we know about (and they may well be doing more under the table for official purposes) and also standing as the number one producer of gold, with ~360 tonnes of domestic production, none of which is exported, China is consuming at least 44% of total yearly world gold production.

Connect that with India importing between 200 and 300 tons per quarter (2011 imports were 967 tonnes, and 2012 was 864 tonnes), and this represents another 33% of total world mine output.  Add in Russia buying more official gold, and you suddenly find that a commanding proportion of the newly mined gold in the world is headed East, where it used to stay largely in the West.

To be clear, I view gold as money and therefore wealth itself.  Everything else that can be manufactured out of thin air is merely a claim on wealth.  In these terms, the West is slowly but steadily bleeding control of wealth to the East, something I thought our leaders were both aware of and focused on.

Knowing the lower prices will only exacerbate this West-to-East flow, I therefore thought that the bullion banks and central banks would not have dared push that dynamic any further.   But apparently no, obviously I was wrong, which pains me on several levels.

Add to this the various things going on in the world today, and I honestly thought we were in the most gold-favorable landscape of my life.

Consider:

  • Negative real interest rates (powerfully gold- and commodity-friendly throughout history)
  • North Korea threatening nuclear and conventional war
  • Open confiscation of wealth in Europe from bank accounts
  • Japan doubling their monetary base in a brazenly desperate bid to stoke inflation by attacking Japanese trust in their own currency
  • Extremely unfavorable bond yields up and down the yield ladder
  • Continued European stress and discord with the possibility of a Eurozone disintegration

Taken together, this level of system, sovereign, and institutional uncertainty is about as gold-friendly a situation one could concoct…

Total 42 items