From James Harkin (Webmaster & Editor of LindseyWilliams.net). Here is a summary of articles of interest from around the world for this week. Please LIKE the Lindsey Williams Online Facebook Page to see stories posted daily regarding the current state of the economy around the world.

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Latest News From July 22, 2016 to July 28, 2016:

• The U.S. Presidential Election is a Mess – Thank Goodness!
  Let's put in bluntly: the United States Presidential election campaign is a complete and utter mess. We are looking a country that is deeply divided on key and fundamental differences. We are looking at two potential leaders that stand in stark difference to one another and are attracting very different supporters because of this. Thank God! Finally, we are seeing a campaign that is different. Finally, we are seeing an election cycle that your vote will make a difference. In the past, any Presidential candidate you voted for was typically controlled by the same financial elite pulling their strings. They have been the puppet masters behind the scenes for decades. Arguably, we have not seen a real President of the United States since the era of Reagan, and even he was made to step in line after his botched assassination attempt.
• Stocks Were Already Crashing the Last Two Times this Happened. So What Gives?
  Over the last 20 years, margin debt – when investors buy stocks with borrowed money – went through three multi-year run-ups, each topped off with a spike, followed by a reversal and decline: during the final throes of the bubbles in 2000 and 2007, each followed by an epic stock market crash – and now. That pattern of jointly soaring and then declining margin debt and stocks even occurred during the run-up and near-20% swoon in 2011.
• Contagion from Italy’s Bank Meltdown Spreads
  Without a taxpayer-funded bailout that directly contravenes the Eurozone’s new bail-in rules, the world’s oldest surviving bank, Monte Dei Paschi, could soon be out of business. Shares of the decrepit financial entity have long been reduced to a penny stock. So far this year, they’ve lost 78% to close on Tuesday at an inconsequential €0.28. The closer it comes to its end, the louder the calls for its rescue. Last week saw two out of three of the members of the institutional triad formerly known as the Troika — the ECB and the IMF — lend their support to a taxpayer funded bailout of Italy’s banking system. So, too, did the biggest U.S. bank by assets, JP Morgan Chase.
• Armageddon Approaches — Paul Craig Roberts
  The Western public doesn’t know it, but Washington and its European vassals are convincing Russia that they are preparing to attack. Eric Zuesse reports on a German newspaper leak of a Bundeswehr decision to declare Russia to be an enemy nation of Germany. This is the interpretation that some Russian politicians themselves have put on the NATO military bases that Washington is establishing on Russia’s borders. Washington might intend the military buildup as pressure on President Putin to reduce Russian opposition to Washington’s unilateralism. However, it reminds some outspoken Russians such as Vladimir Zhirinovsky of Hitler’s troops on Russia’s border in 1941.
• Deutsche Bank Profit Plunges 98% And The Worst Is Yet To Come
  The latest confirmation that Germany's troubled banking giant Deutsche Bank is unable to navigate the troubled waters of NIRP came on Wednesday when the bank announced that its second-quarter net income fell 98% from a year earlier, hurt by weaker performances in trading, investment banking and other core areas. The lender said net income tumbled to €20 million ($22 million) from €818 million a year earlier, modestly better than the €22mm loss expected, while net revenue dropped 20% to €7.4 billion. After rebounding modestly on the beat, the bank’s shares fell tumbled 5% on Wednesday morning, their lower level in 2 weeks; today's decline has dragged DB stock 45% lower in 2016, making it one of Europe's worst performers YTD (the Stoxx 600 is down 27% in 2016).
• Gold Price Set To Skyrocket To $2,300 In 22 Months!
  With continued volatility in key global markets, the gold price is set to skyrocket to $2,300 in 22 months! There is also a remarkable chart included in this fantastic piece. Gold Is Back! The instability of growth induced by credit expansion, which we routinely criticize, is impressively illustrated by the following chart. Since 1959, “total credit market debt” – the broadest debt aggregate in the US – has increased by 9,100%, its annualized growth rate amounts to 8.26%. In every decade, outstanding debt has at least doubled. In order to get credit-induced GDP growth to restart again after the volume of total outstanding debt dipped slightly for the first time in 2009, the Fed implemented a series of never before seen monetary policy measures.
• You’re Likely Committing a Crime Right Now
  Do you own a dog? You could face six months in federal prison If you walk it on federal lands on a leash longer than six feet in length. Do you have a bank account? If you deposit or withdraw more than $10,000 in cash over multiple transactions, you could be imprisoned for up to five years. You could also lose every penny in the account, under the theory it “facilitated” your crime. Do you have foreign investments? If you neglect to tell Uncle Sam about them, you could face draconian penalties. Forget to file just one form? You could face a $10,000 penalty per account per year. There’s no requirement that you know any of these crimes exist for you to be found guilty of violating them. After all, “Ignorance of the law is no excuse.”
• Halliburton Reports A Negative Income
  On Wednesday, Halliburton released their earnings reports, revealing a $3.21 billion loss. That amounts to a $3.73 per share loss. The firm also announced that they cut another 5,000 jobs in the second quarter. During the same period last year, Halliburton managed to turn a $54 million profit. Much of the Halliburton loss was due to the $3.5 billion payment to Baker Hughes after the failed merger earlier this year. The combination of the two companies faced opposition from multiple international antitrust organizations.
• Terror Attacks And Mass Killings Are Becoming A Daily Event
  Terror attacks and mass killings are happening so rapidly now that it is really difficult to keep up with them all.  In fact, as you will see below, so far there have been several this week alone.  This latest attack in France during which radical Islamic terrorists slit the throat of a Catholic priest was particularly disturbing.  Just a few days ago I warned that churches in the western world would be targeted, and now it is happening.  According to thereligionofpeace.com, there have been 1274 Islamic terror attacks in 2016.  These attacks have been spread across 50 different nations, and as a result of these attacks more than 11,000 people have been killed and more than 14,000 people have been injured.  When are we going to finally wake up and understand how serious this threat really is? Very few people would have imagined that a sleepy Catholic church in France would be the target of an Islamic terror attack on Tuesday morning, but that is precisely what happened.
• Questionable Libyan Oil Deal Could Further Escalate Oil War
  Tripoli-based National Oil Corporation of Libya (NOC) chairman Mustafa Sanalla has protested to the U.N. envoy to Libya Martin Kobler over a deal struck with militia strongman and Petrol Facilities Guards (PFG) head Ibrahim Jadran to resume Libyan oil exports through the key terminals of Ras Lanuf, Es Sider and Zueitina. In a letter obtained by Oilprice.com, Sanalla describes the deal as a big mistake that essentially rewards Jadran for his blockade of Libyan oil exports for three years, which resulted in US$100 billion in losses to the Libyan government. UN envoy Kobler flew to Ras Lanuf on 21 July to meet with the controversial PFG leader, after which the two announced in a joint press conference that oil exports would now be resumed through the ports.
• Study: NC Green Energy Law Will Destroy 50,000 Jobs
  North Carolina’s green energy mandate will end 50,000 mostly manufacturing jobs and cost $7 billion by the end of the decade, according to a new study by a scientist from the University of Wyoming. The study found that the North Carolina Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), which requires 12.5 percent of the state’s power comes from green energy by 2020, will increase electricity prices by 42 percent. The rate hike will cost the state billions, and destroy 50,000 jobs, mostly in the manufacturing and services sectors.
• What Will Happen To Turkey’s Energy Security Following The Failed Coup?
  On July 15, 2016, a new chapter opened in Turkish political history. A group of military officers attempted a coup to overthrow the Erdogan regime in Turkey. Recep Tayyip Erdogan was elected as President of Turkey in August 2014, and since then Turkish politics has been experiencing turbulence. The most common criticisms of the Erdogan regime include allegations of corruption, restrictions of freedom, and foreign policy crises, such as with Syria and Russia. It is expected that the post-coup attempt period will also be unsteady. According to some experts, Erdogan may take advantage of the coup attempt to set up a more authoritarian system. As a matter of fact, experts consider it likely that there will be another coup in the months or years to come. The question is, while Turkish politics is in upheaval, what will happen to Turkey’s energy security?
• Erdogan shuts down 1,000+ private schools, 1,200+ charities, 15 universities
  Turkey’s purge of Gulen supporters continued on Saturday with the closure of hundreds of private schools, charities and other institutions suspects of links with the US-based cleric. Ankara declared a state of emergency after a failed military coup. The decree issued by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is his first since the state of emergency was declared on Wednesday. He has ordered the closure of 1,043 private schools, 1,229 charities and foundations, 19 trade unions, 15 universities and 35 medical institutions, state news agency Anadolu reported on Saturday. The organizations slated to be shut down are suspected of links with US-based Muslim cleric, Fethullah Gulen, a former ally of Erdogan, who turned into his fierce opponent. The Turkish government accused Gulen of having a hand behind the last week’s coup attempt as well as earlier attacks on it.
• Italy Races To Arrange €5 Billion Bailout For Monte Paschi Before Friday's Stress Test 
  As we noted over the weekend, Italy's bank stress test the result of which is due out on Friday, is a “near-term stress event”, and one which Italy's most troubled bank, Monte dei Paschi di Siena, is expected to fail. It is Monte Paschi's massive non-performing debt load that is also the reason why over the past month Italy's Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has been desperately spinning Brexit as a catalyst event which would get Germany's blessing to enact a taxpayer-funded, public, bailout of not just the world's oldest, and Italy's third largest, bank but also of the entire Italian banking sector. Alas that has not panned out as expected, and Italy never got Germany's – or Dijsselbloem's – permission to launch another TARP. Which explains why moments ago the FT reported that Italy was last night “racing to secure a privately backed bailout of Monte dei Paschi di Siena, the most exposed of the country’s troubled lenders, including a plan to raise €5 billion of fresh capital so as to avert nationalisation, according to bankers and European officials.”
• These Are The Best And Worst U.S. Cities To Own A House
  Earlier today, in its latest update looking at March home prices, Case Shiller pointed out that “home prices continue to appreciate across the country”, at just over 5%, a pace that has held since early 2015. Actually that is an understatement: in 16 of 20 of the tracked metro areas, the pace of home appreciation over the past year was 5% or higher, or equivalent to more than twice the pace of core inflation. And with rents continuing to soar across the country, in many cases at a double digit clip, not to mention exploding healthcare costs, one wonders just what the BLS “measures” with its monthly CPI update.
• Nigeria Says “Don't Panic, Banks Are Fine” Amid Currency Collapse, Inflation Spike Concerns
  A month ago we warned of the looming hyperinflation coming to Nigeria (as well as much of Africa). It appears, following the central banks' rate hike to a record 14% (reach for yield anyone) in an attempt to stall the ongoing currency collapse, that Emefiele is worried, warning of “concern over headline inflation spike.” Perhaps most worrying though, amid the chaos, Emefiele advised depositors in banks “to go about your business,” adding that there was “no need to panic or worry.” Hhhmm… The rate hike is not working, Spot Naira is tumbling on the day to record lows, and forward rates are signaling much more to come… but don't let that stop Emefiele from jawboning… *NIGERIA'S EMEFIELE:`SO FAR, SO GOOD' ON NEW FX REGIME
• One Analyst's Surprising Indicator Why Recession Is Coming In Early 2017
  Stifel analyst Paul Westra downgraded the restaurant industry in a note released today, slashing estimates and ratings on 11 stocks in the sector, while warning that a slowdown in the restaurant industry is a harbinger for an overall economic recession. The report warns that the restaurant industry is facing a perfect storm of slowing demand, rising minimum wage mandates across the country and minimal opportunity for commodity cost declines. This fits with the thesis laid out by KeyBanc analysts last week, suggested last week when upgrading Papa John's Pizza on the expectations that the recent surge in political unrest and terrorism fears would prompt more Americans to stay at home and order food instead of eating out.
• New Legislation Proposes To “Bail-In' Social Security
  It was only a few weeks ago that I told you about the government’s annual report on Social Security. It was a veritable death sentence for the program. The Board of Trustees for Social Security (which includes the US Treasury Secretary) wrote that major parts of the program have already run out of money, and the rest of Social Security will run out of money in the next decade. Amazing. Even Social Security knows that they’re bankrupt and unable to keep their promises to taxpayers.
• Zimbabwe government asks workers to work for free as government is broke
  SPEAKER of Parliament Advocate Jacob Mudenda on Friday called on workers to work overtime and expect not to be paid extra remuneration. Mudenda said this would steer productivity and ensure companies remain afloat than for them to retrench workers because of low production. He was speaking at the Institute of People Management of Zimbabwe (IPMZ) convention in Victoria Falls, where he also advocated for empathy among workers and directors. The convention which ended Saturday was being held under the theme “Igniting human resources in the changing environs-evolve, transform and add value” and was attended by human resources managers and directors from private and public companies countrywide. Mudenda told the managers that they should strive to create an environment that would compel workers to provide labour for no extra-pay.
• RBS Customers May Face Negative Interest Rates
  The RBS banking group has warned 1.3 million customers they could be charged negative interest rates if the Bank of England cuts base rates below zero. The group, which includes NatWest, wrote to its business and commercial account holders about the potential changes, which mean they could lose money even when they are in credit. The letter said: “Global interest rates remain at very low levels and in some markets are currently negative. “Dependent on future market conditions, this could result in us charging on credit balances.”
• More Abenomics Failing—-Japan’s June Exports Down 7.4% Y/Y, Ninth Consecutive Monthly Drop
  Japan’s exports dropped again in June, with shipments down for a ninth consecutive month, underscoring the continuing challenge of reviving the nation’s economy. Key Points: Overseas shipments declined 7.4 percent in June from a year earlier, the Ministry of Finance said on Monday. This was better than the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg, which pointed to an 11.3 percent drop. Imports slid 18.8 percent, leaving a trade surplus of 692.8 billion yen ($6.5 billion). Japan had a trade surplus of 1.81 trillion yen in the January-June period, the first surplus since the second half-year of 2010.
• Morgan Stanley Predicts Plummeting Oil Prices – $35 Likely
  The price of oil will likely continue to falter in the latter half of this year amid an oversupply of gasoline, according to a Morgan Stanley study published last Sunday. The Morgan Stanley analysts predicted numerous “worrisome trends” for the supply and demand of oil, chief of which is an excessive production of gasoline by refineries. The study’s authors believe that faced with the need to cut back on capacity utilization to protect profit margins, these refineries will cut back on crude oil purchases and drag prices lower in an attempt to protect profit margins. “Crude oil demand is trending below refined product demand for the first time in three years…Given the oversupply in the refined product markets, fading refinery margins, and economic run cuts, we expect crude oil demand to deteriorate further over the coming months,” the report detailed.
• Trump Forsees A Grim Future For The US Economy…
  Trump Got It Right Again. However, the mainstream media isn't saying a word about it! What are they really trying to cover up? Are we really entering the final phase of the financial system? Trump knows that this may be the final bubble.
• Oil Bulls Headed Over Demand Cliff as Refinery Shutdowns Loom
  Beware, oil bulls: Just as U.S. oil production sinks low enough to drain supplies, demand is about to fall off a cliff. American gasoline consumption typically ebbs in August and September as vacationers return home, and refiners use that dip to shut for seasonal maintenance. Over the past five years, refiners’ thirst for oil has dropped an average of 1.2 million barrels a day from July to October.
• G-20 Meeting Ends With Rising Discord Between China And US
  Over the weekend, the Group of 20 convened in yet another meeting in Chengdu, China, where they reiterated a long-running pledge to use all policy tools to help boost confidence and growth, but instead of emphasizing monetary policy the group said they would focus on fiscal and structural measures. Then again, since incremental fiscal stimulus would likely result in additional central bank monetization in order to avoid a steep selloff in government bonds and risk a yield spike, what the G-20 really did is set the stage for even more central bank-funded deficit spending, aka soft helicopter money.
• Hong Kong On The Edge—–Debt And Property bubble fixing to Burst
  Hong Kong’s economy can’t hold on for much longer. For one thing, the territory is in the midst of two large bubbles. One is a credit bubble, similar to the one in China. Since 2008, the ratio of private nonfinancial credit to GDP has surged to 281% in Hong Kong. The other is Hong Kong’s infamous property bubble. Since 2008, property prices have risen 105%. Prices peaked in August of last year, and have been declining since — a correction of 14% that has put the property market in “free fall” and contributed to a growth slowdown — but remain higher than they were in 1997, when the last bubble burst.
• Goldman Warns Of A Sharp Plunge In Stocks In “Next Few Months”
  That Goldman's David Kostin has been warning about the possibility of a sudden, sharp drawdown in the market, is not new: we first reported on that in early May when we presented “Six Reasons Why Goldman Is Suddenly Warning About A “Large Drop” In The Market” in which we cited the head Goldman equity strategist who said that “unbalanced distribution of upside/downside risks suggests “sell in May” or buy protection.” He adds that “we continue to expect S&P 500 will end 2016 at 2100, roughly 3% above the current level even as “a shift in investor perception of various risks could easily trigger a drawdown.”
• Donald Trump is Right About Globalization: It’s a Broken System
  While seemingly elegant in theory, globalization suffers in practice. That is the lesson of Brexit and of the rise of Donald Trump in the United States. And it also underpins the increasingly virulent anti-China backlash now sweeping the world. Those who worship at the altar of free trade, including me, must come to grips with this glaring disconnect. Truth be known, there is no rigorous theory of globalization. The best that economists can offer is David Ricardo’s early-19th century framework: If a country simply produces in accordance with its comparative advantage (in terms of resource endowments and workers’ skills), presto, it will gain through increased cross-border trade. Trade liberalization — the elixir of globalization — promises benefits for all.
• The Last Two Times P/E Multiples Expanded This Much, The Result Was A Historic Crash
  It’s not just former Fed economists who are getting worried. So is Goldman. As we wrote last weekend, “With “Stock Valuations At Extremes” Goldman’s Clients Are Asking Just One Question“, namely how much longer can the rally continue.  This followed another Goldman warning from two weeks ago, where as we noted before, “Goldman Warns Of A Sharp Plunge In Stocks In “Next Few Months.” Who knows: maybe Goldman will be right and the market will plunge – it certainly isn’t trading at all time highs and 25x GAAP multiples on fundamentals. But for now those who heeded Goldman’s warning and traded ahead of a 10% “pullback” have gotten crushed.
• John Pilger: Why Hillary Clinton Is More Dangerous Than Donald Trump
  The following is an edited version of an address given by John Pilger at the University of Sydney, entitled ‘A World War Has Begun’. I have been filming in the Marshall Islands, which lie north of Australia, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Whenever I tell people where I have been, they ask, “Where is that?” If I offer a clue by referring to “Bikini”, they say, “You mean the swimsuit.” Few seem aware that the bikini swimsuit was named to celebrate the nuclear explosions that destroyed Bikini island.
• Japan government planning at least 20 trillion yen to support economy: Kyodo
  The Japanese government is planning to compile a stimulus package of at least 20 trillion yen ($186.60 billion) to help the economy emerge from deflation and fend off possible adverse effects of Brexit, Kyodo reported on Thursday, citing sources close to the matter. The stimulus package is likely to be double the 10 trillion-plus yen that was previously expected, as it will now include projects for fiscal 2017 and beyond and increase “zaito” low-interest government loans by 6 trillion yen, Kyodo reported, citing the sources.
• Reserve Bank hints at rate cuts, dollar falls 
  The Reserve Bank is set to cut its cash rate next month to a record low and may deliver further cuts later in the year, to counter risks to economic growth, low inflation and a high dollar. The central bank this morning gave a clear signal of lower interest rates, which knocked the New Zealand dollar almost 1 percent lower. “At this stage it seems likely that further policy easing will be required to ensure that future average inflation settles near the middle of the target range,” Reserve Bank Governor Graeme Wheeler said in an unscheduled economic update.
• Philly Fed Slumps To 6-Month Lows As National Activity Index Jumps To 6-Month Highs
  In the first wave of macro data today, initial claims beat expectations, dropping to 253k near record lows (but remains wildly divergent from tumbling consumer confidence). Following June's rebound in Philly Fed, July missed expectations tumbling to six-month lows, back to a contractionary -2.9 (against expectations of a flat print of +4.5). Finally, Chicago Fed's National Activity Index surged unexpectedly to six-month highs (+0.16 vs -0.20 exp) but the smoother 3-month avg remains in contraction for its 17th straight month. If the jobs market is so awesome, judging by initial claims near historic lows, then why is US consumer's economic confidence collapsing?
• Plan to Solve Puerto Rican Debt Crisis Already Off the Rails
  Efforts to solve the Puerto Rican debt crisis have already run off the rails. Late last month, Congress passed a bill allowing Puerto Rico to restructure its debt. Under the plan, the US territory essentially declared bankruptcy. The US government won’t expend funds to bail out Puerto Rico, but will allow the island’s government to pay back debtors at less than 100%. Although the bill doesn’t say so explicitly, for all practical purposes it created a bankruptcy process for the island.
• Two-year Brexit ‘shadow' looms over global economy concedes Philip Hammond
  The result of the EU referendum will “hang over the world economic outlook” until at least 2018, Philip Hammond has said on the sidelines of the G20 finance ministers' meeting in Chengdu, China. While the chancellor conceded that a two-year Brexit “shadow” looms, he said it is “just one of many sources of uncertainty that the world's economic governance mechanisms have to deal with.” Speaking to Sky News, Hammond said: “It [the EU referendum result] was a shock to the economic system. It was not something that markets or businesses were expecting. “So obviously there was going to be a reaction, a response to that,” he added. “And because there will now be a fairly lengthy negotiating period, there is going to be uncertainty about the outcome hanging over the world economic outlook for perhaps the next couple of years.”
• After NATO, the WTO: Trump ready to rip up post-war order
  Toughening immigration checks for the French and Germans, questioning NATO obligations and hinting at an exit from the World Trade Organization: Donald Trump cast further doubt Sunday on US alliances and commitments around the world. In his first wide-ranging interview since he was crowned the Republican Party's White House nominee, the billionaire and political novice spelled out his stance on a slew of foreign policy, international trade and national security issues. If he wins in November, he told NBC's “Meet the Press,” France and other nations hit by recent terror attacks would be subjected to “extreme” immigration checks as a deterrent to attacks on US soil.
• Central Bank Wonderland is Complete and Now Open for Business — The Epocalypse Has Fully Begun
  Summer vacation is here, and the whole global family has arrived at Central-Bank Wonderland, the upside-down, inside-out world that banksters and their puppet politicians call “recovery.” Everyone is talking about it as wizened traders puzzle over how stocks and bonds soared, hand-in-hand, in face of the following list of economic thrills.
• DAVID MORGAN: After the ship has sunk, everyone knows how it might have been saved.
  Phil interviews the silver guru David Morgan to discuss the recent momentum and long-term upside in the silver market. Phil and John cover Brexit and some of the action in the precious metals market since the June 23rd vote.
• Oliver Stone: Pokemon Go is a New Stage in “Totalitarism” and “Surveillance Capitalism” 
  Film director Oliver Stone believes that Pokemon Go is a tool capable of collecting massive amounts of data about its users and represents a step towards “robot society”. The director of Platoon, Wallstreet and JFK was at Comic-Con 2016 in San Diego to discuss his new movie Snowden. Considering the topic of the movie, the panel were discussing the NSA, online privacy and government surveillance. A question from a fan lead Oliver Stone to lash out against today’s newest worldwide phenomenon: Pokemon Go.
• Kmart workers believe all the stores are going to be imminently shut down
  Kmart employees believe the company is nearing bankruptcy and is in the process of shutting down all its stores. The chain has closed one-third of its stores in the last decade, and sales have been cut in half in the same time period. Store-level employees who spoke to Business Insider said many of the remaining 941 Kmart stores now appear to be in the midst of liquidation. Stores are being entered into numbered phases — such as Phase 1 and Phase 2 — employees said.
• Hammond Seeks Brexit Business Boost In China
  The Chancellor has arrived in China to promote Britain as a destination for “new opportunities” in the wake of the Brexit vote. It is Philip Hammond's first trade trip since his appointment – with the significance of the destination underlined by the Treasury which said the UK was currently home to more Chinese investment that any EU country. It said this would be the first of several such visits to key economic partners following the referendum.
• Zimbabwe Misses Own Deadline to Pay $1.8 Billion; Pays None
  Zimbabwe failed to repay $1.8 billion to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and African Development Bank by its own June 30 deadline. “Right now, we’ve not paid anything,” John Mangudya, Zimbabwe’s central bank governor, said by phone from the capital, Harare, on Thursday. “That is why we have this re-engagement process with international financial institutions.” Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa said earlier the country would repay at least $1.8 billion by the end of June to be able to resume borrowing in a bid to revive an economy that’s half the size it was in 2000. Zimbabwe owes $110 million to the IMF, $1.1 billion to the World Bank and $601 million to the African Development Bank, Mangudya said in an e-mailed response to questions on Thursday.
• Sinking Yields Drag Investment Income to 12-Year Low at Insurers
  U.S. property-casualty insurers’ quarterly investment income dropped to the lowest since 2004 as falling bond yields pressured the industry. The figure fell to $10.9 billion in the three months ended March 31 from $11.7 billion a year earlier, according to a report Thursday from the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America and ISO, a unit of Verisk Analytics Inc. The annualized yield on the industry’s portfolio fell to 2.9 percent from 3.1 percent. That compares with an average of 3.8 percent over the past decade and peaks of more than 8 percent in 1984 and 1985.
• Spanish Slapdown Shows Timing Matters When Breaking EU Rules
  Spain might justifiably claim to be the victim of unfortunate timing and an arbitrary application of rules. Under European Union principles, countries should keep their budget deficits below 3 percent of gross domestic product.  This matters now more than ever, because persistent infringements of the EU’s rules on budgets have helped erode confidence in the bloc and its currency, the euro. What the euro area needs now more than anything is confidence that it will survive. Spain has breached the measure every year since 2008 — a total of eight times. With neighboring Portugal falling short 15 times, it can't come as a total surprise that the two are about to become the first EU nations to be slapped with a fine for running an excessive deficit.
• China Fuels Speculation Debt-for-Equity Swaps Starting Soon
  China’s cabinet fueled speculation that the nation is pressing ahead with debt-to-equity swaps that would give lenders stakes in some companies as part of tackling a build-up in corporate leverage and bad loans. A brief reference in a statement on Monday to letting financial institutions hold stakes in companies in a trial indicated that the swaps are coming soon, according to China Merchants Securities Co. analyst Ma Kunpeng. Caixin magazine reported that the State Council was signaling the start of the program, citing an unidentified person close to the authorities.
• Bank of America second quarter profits fall 19%
  Bank of America reported a 19% slide in profit in the second quarter, as persistently low interest rates hurt the bank's loan business. The bank made just $3.89bn (£2.93bn) in profit during the period between April and June, down from $4.8bn last year. The results still beat analysts expectations, and Bank of America's shares rose 1.8%. Profits across US banks have been hit by the Federal Reserve's low interest rate policy.
• Obamacare company shutdown leaves customers in a lurch, facing higher costs
  Ken Sullivan bought health insurance for his family this year from Land of Lincoln Health, a small, nonprofit company in Chicago. The 52-year-old Chicagoan knew the purchase was a risk because the three-year-old insurer was struggling financially. But he said he didn't have much choice after Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois eliminated his plan last year and its alternative didn't include any of his family's doctors and hospitals. Now his worst fears have come true. The Illinois Insurance Department moved Tuesday to shut down Land of Lincoln because of its unstable financial health, leaving about 49,000 policyholders in a lurch. They will lose coverage in the coming months, but neither regulators nor the company have said exactly when.
• Singapore Seeks U.S. Chapter 11 Prowess in Bankruptcy Reform
  Singapore is seeking to enhance its position as a center for debt restructuring by giving its insolvency law some of the powers of the U.S. bankruptcy code’s Chapter 11, just as companies worldwide default on bonds at the fastest pace since the global financial crisis. The government has “broadly accepted” 17 recommendations submitted by a committee after a yearlong review, the Ministry of Law said in a statement. Those include offering automatic stay of legal and enforcement actions for debtors, creating a bench of specialist judges for its bankruptcy court and increasing rescue-financing capital by enticing distressed-debt funds and private equity firms to set up shop in the city-state.
• India introduces first bankruptcy law
  India is the world's fastest-growing major economy, but just five years ago it was a very different story. Growth had slowed and many businesses could not repay money they had borrowed. That hit the country's banks hard – and some are still swamped with bad debts. Now India has put in place its first bankruptcy laws – designed to try and help lenders.
• Puerto Rico Sued for Diverting Cash After Federal Law Passed
  A group of hedge funds sued Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla, claiming the island government is using a default on its debt to shirk its responsibility to pay bondholders. Puerto Rico defaulted on almost $1 billion of principal and interest on July 1 as Garcia Padilla said the commonwealth was unable to pay creditors and continue essential services. It happened one day after President Barack Obama enacted a law, called Promesa, creating a federal control board to oversee the restructuring of the commonwealth’s $70 billion of debt. The law also shields Puerto Rico from creditor lawsuits seeking repayment.
• 19.4 Trillion Dollars In Debt – We Have Added 1.1 Trillion Dollars A Year To The National Debt Under Obama
  In 2006, U.S. Senator Barack Obama’s voice thundered across the Senate floor as he boldly declared that “increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren.”  That was one of the truest things that he ever said, but just a couple of years later he won the 2008 election and he turned his back on those principles.  As I write this article, the U.S. national debt is sitting at a grand total of $19,402,361,890,929.46.  But when Barack Obama first entered the White House, our federal government was only 10.6 trillion dollars in debt.  That means that we have added an average of 1.1 trillion dollars a year to the national debt under Obama, and we still have about six more months to go.
• A U.S. Junk-Bond Sale Gets Pulled as Investors Show Their Limits
  Bond investors globally are clamoring for yield, but they’ll only take so much risk to get it. Case in point: U.S. Xpress Enterprises Inc. scrapped its $320 million bond offering late Wednesday after investors, concerned that growth is slowing in the trucking industry, pushed for higher yields on the securities. It was the first pulled deal in the junk-bond market in two months.
• Prominent Gold Skeptic Willem Buiter Says “Gold Looks Pretty Good”
  Back in November 2014, Willem Buiter, who has so far been wrong in his recent gloomier forecasts about the fallout from the Eurozone mess, or his predictions about a global economy, decided to become a commodity expert and announced that “Gold Is A 6,000 Year Old Bubble.” The irony is that while virtually every other asset class in the span of these 6,000 years has risen, risen more, in many cases indeed formed a bubble, burst, fallen, and ultimately turned to dust and forgotten, gold remains and furthermore has seen its value in recent years soar.
• India Moves Nearly One Hundred Tanks, Troops to Chinese Border
  With tensions rising between China and India, New Delhi has deployed nearly 100 tanks to its eastern border. The mountainous region of Ladakh, in northern India, lies in a tense location between disputed Kashmir and Tibet. In an effort to boost its military presence in the area, the Indian military has sent Russian-made T-72 tanks to Ladakh’s Chinese border. “The vast flat valleys along the mountain ranges allow for armored movement; besides, there has been an increase in the force levels across the border,” an unnamed military official told NDTV.
• Have we learned nothing from 2008? It’s clear we’re heading into recession
  This week the International Monetary Fund and the European commission slashed their forecasts for UK growth. The referendum result had “thrown a spanner in the works” of the global recovery, the IMF said. It now expects the UK economy to grow by 1.3% in 2017, compared with its 2.2% prediction in April. The commission’s projections were, at best, 1.1% growth next year and worst case, a 0.3% contraction. Both sets of forecasts look optimistic. It seems almost inevitable that the UK is heading for recession. The Bank of England governor, Mark Carney, had clearly signalled that his monetary policy committee (MPC) would cut rates at its July meeting, but it didn’t. Hopefully, its members will make up for this big mistake at their next meeting in August.
• Potential Crisis Triggers Continue To Pile Up In 2016
  We are a little over half way through 2016 and, at the current rate, it will be a miracle if the year finishes without outright catastrophe in half the nations of the world. Some might call these events “Black Swans,” some might call them completely engineered threats, others might call it all a simple “coincidence” or a tragedy of errors. I stand strictly by the position that most of the dangers we see today have been deliberately escalated, if not strategically implemented. Here is the problem; international financiers and globalist nut-jobs are clearly operating on a timeline with the end goal of creating enough general chaos to convince the masses that complete centralized authority over every aspect of our lives is preferable to constant fear.
• REVEALED: EU subsidises the CHINESE steel which is decimating British industry
  BRITISH taxpayers have been forced to subsidise the very Chinese steel companies that are threatening 40,000 UK jobs, critics say. It comes after revelations that the European Investment Bank has given so-called “soft loans” to China of £80million as part of a climate policy intended to lower emissions. The astonishing figures include a loan of £40million to one of the world’s worst “steel dumping” culprits, the Wuhan Iron & Steel Corporation. To add insult to injury Wuhun, the world’s eighth largest steel producer, boasts the Chinese state as its main shareholder. Wuhun is such a prolific steel dumper that it has now been especially targeted by the European Commission, which wants to slap it with 36.6 per cent tariffs.
• Russian warplanes reportedly bombed US base in Syria
  Russian warplanes reportedly bombed a secret military base in Syria used by elite American and British forces last month. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that the Russian strike on the CIA-linked site was part of a campaign by Russia to pressure the White House to agree to closer cooperation in the Syrian skies, U.S. military and intelligence officials said. Despite the fact that some forces could have been killed and the bombing dampened relations between Russia and the Pentagon and CIA, the White House and State Department still persued a compromise.
• EU TRADE DISASTER: Deal with Canada on the brink as German party SUES Brussels over CETA
  THE European Union’s flagship trade deal with Canada was on the brink of collapse today after a Germany political party sued Brussels over its implementation. Centre-left Die Linke has launched legal action to block the controversial Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) pact, saying it is unconstitutional under German law. The party’s attempt to torpedo the hated deal is just the latest in a series of devastating trade blows for the EU, which is unravelling following the Brexit vote.
• Japanese Turning to Gold as Their Economy Spirals into Central Bank Oblivion
  The Japanese economy is sliding into oblivion pulled along by central bank policy. In response, the Japanese people are buying gold. Economic growth has languished in Japan for nearly two decades despite extraordinary monetary policy including negative interest rates and round after round of stimulus. The government even flirted with the idea of helicopter money, although that appears to be off the table, at least for the time being. Factory output is down and stocks are slumping. The Japanese government just cut its GDP estimate from 1.7% to 0.4%, and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe urged more central bank intervention. He called for coordinated stimulus from the government and the central bank in yet another attempt to revive the ailing economy.
• Silver Up 44.7% in First Half of 2016
  While investors have primarily focused on gold’s bull run, silver has quietly outperformed the yellow metal. Between Jan. 1 and July 11, the price of silver increased 44.7%, according to the Silver Institute. The price of gold increased 27.7% in that same time period. The Silver Institute said the surge in the price of silver was “fueled by increased investor interest in silver as a safe haven asset and as leveraged exposure to gold’s price rally.”
• Government Student Loan Policies Have Perverse Incentives
  Millions of Americans are saddled with student loan payments. And that’s just considering those who can actually repay their debt. Data released in March revealed that 46% of student loans are not currently being repaid. But despite the squeeze student loan repayment puts on American budgets, few choose to refinance their debt at lower interest rates.
• Business Inventories At Highest Level To Sales Since The Crisis
  Autos and buidling materials are at their highest levels of inventories relative to sales since the financial crisis leaving overall business inventories-to-sales ratio hovering near cycle highs at 1.40x. A 0.2% rise in inventories (bigger than expected) matched the 0.2% rise in sales MoM but YoY it's a different picture with sales down 0.3% and inventories up 0.9% (with retailers seeing inventories surging 6.1%).
• Inside Draghi’s Corporate Bond Frenzy—–$10 Billion/ Month, 440 Different Issues, Heavy BBB and BB Risk
  Yesterday for the first time, the various central banks of the Eurosystem disclosed which bonds the ECB had bought under its CSPP program. Specifically, we broke down the purchases of the Bundesbank, which revealed some of the most prominent public company debt issuers in Europe. However, we were curious to get a more detailed look at what Mario Draghi’s trading desk was spending their time BWICing all day. For that we went to the undisputed master when it comes to tracking what the ECB does in the bond realm (because the ECB is not buying equities just yet), BofA’s Barnaby Martin. Here is the big picture as revealed in his report today titled “CSPP: Buying Frenzy” – “in just over a month of the Corporate Sector Purchase Programme, the ECB have bought 458 bonds, with virtually no stone left unturned.With the monthly run-rate of buying hovering around the €8.5bn mark, our conclusion for CSPP is, bluntly, that it is too big, too powerful and ultimately too bullish for spreads.” But the best part was Martin’s answer to the key question: “So what did they buy?” His answer: “In short, almost everything.”
• The Bond Market: Beware of Junkyard Dogs
  Having spent a chunk of his youth “shopping” them, Jim Croce came to know a thing or two about junkyards. In those youthful days, should his clunker de jour be missing some vital part or parts, a trolling expedition through South Philly’s scrap heaps was always the enterprising Croce’s preferred method of procurement. Amid all of Croce’s parts foraging, it was a universal joint for a ‘57 Chevy and a ‘51 Dodge transmission, two must have and must-be-cheap or, better yet, free, parts that the legendary folk singer still recalled. He also reminisced that junkyards could and would provide a no frills, but highly motivated and easy way to get in some cardio, as in running for your life.
• Destination Mars – Asset Price Levitation
  One of the more preposterous deeds of modern central banking involves creating digital monetary credits from nothing and then using the faux money to purchase stocks.  If you’re unfamiliar with this erudite form of monetary policy this may sound rather fantastical.  But, in certain economies, this is now standard operating procedure. For example, in Japan this explicit intervention into the stock market is being performed with the composed tedium of a dairy farmer milking his cows.  The activity is more art than science.  Similarly, if you stop – even for a day – pain swells in certain sensitive areas. In late April, a Bloomberg study found that the Bank of Japan (BOJ), through its purchases of ETFs, had become a top 10 shareholder in about 90 percent of companies that comprise the Nikkei 225.
• IMF Called “Clowns” After Admitting They Fabricated Brexit Doom And Gloom
  “The IMF has serious credibility problems. It has been seriously wrong for years. I hope that one of the things that the new government does is push to have some credible people running this institution… rather than the clowns currently running it,” exclaimed UKIP MP Douglas Carswell, pointing out Lagarde's legion of fools flip-flop that the British economy will grow faster than Germany and France in the next two years – only weeks after its doom-laden warnings about Brexit. As The Daily Mail reports, after saying that leaving the European Union could trigger a UK recession, the International Monetary Fund now expects the British economy to grow by 1.7 per cent this year and 1.3 per cent next year. That is weaker than the 1.9 and 2.2 per cent growth forecasts before the referendum, but the UK is still set to be the second-fastest growing economy in the Group of Seven industrialised nations this year – behind the United States – and third-fastest next year, behind the US and Canada.
• Legend Jeremy Grantham Just Issued A Dire Warning To The World
  With the U.S. dollar continuing its surge as gold and silver pull back, legend Jeremy Grantham has issued a dire warning to the world. A portion of today’s note from Art Cashin:  “You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat! – As you hopefully remember, that’s the famous line from the movie, “Jaws”, uttered when the authorities realize that the problem (the shark) is much, much larger than they first assumed. When it comes to immigration, maybe the line should be – you’re gonna need a bigger wall – and we’re not talking Donald Trump here. We’re referring to Britain, the EU and what fear might have helped pushed the Brexit vote through. Jeremy Grantham touched on the potentially explosive possibilities of immigration pressures in a recent discussion of Brexit.

Precious Metals Are The Only Lifeboat! I have persistently WARNED you what was happening in the gold market and why you needed to convert your paper assets to physical gold and silver by the middle of September 2015. You need to hedge against the financial instability with physical gold and silver. Call the experts to help you convert your IRA or 401k into Gold, Silver and Other Precious Metals. Call GoldCo NOW before it's too late! Call Toll-Free 1-877-414-1385.

From James Harkin (Webmaster & Editor of LindseyWilliams.net). Here is a summary of articles of interest from around the world for this week. Please LIKE the Lindsey Williams Online Facebook Page to see stories posted daily regarding the current state of the economy around the world.

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Latest News From July 15, 2016 to July 21, 2016:

• David Stockman On The Coming Global Collapse As One Short Seller Warns “I Have No Idea How Long They Can Keep Pretending”
  With continued uncertainty in global markets, David Stockman weighed in on the coming global collapse and one short seller warned, “I have no idea how long they can keep pretending.” – Overnight equity markets were slightly lower, with bonds markets slightly higher in uneventful trading. As for our equity market, Netflix provided some fireworks, as it lost badly at the game of beat-the-number and the stock price was hammered for 14%. IBM, however, managed to win at Wall Street’s favorite game by making enough acquisitions to make the estimates. For those keeping score at home, revenues were down about 3%, making this the seventeenth quarter in a row for that feat. Debt now stands at $42 billion and book value is minus $27…
• Governments To Christians: Don’t You Dare Speak Out Against The Sexual Sin In Society
  In our upside down world, evil has become good and good has become evil.  Once upon a time, everyone in society generally knew what was “right” and what was “wrong” even if they didn’t always abide by the rules.  But now the rules have been totally flipped on their head.  If you choose to live a lifestyle that is morally wrong, you are celebrated by society, and if you choose to speak out against the sexual sin that is exploding everywhere around us then you are considered to be a “hater” and a “bigot”.  In fact, governments all over the world are now passing “hate speech” laws that are making it a crime to speak out against sexual sin.  With each passing year it gets even worse, and those pushing this agenda forward are never going to be satisfied until those standing up for Biblical truth are locked away in prison.
• Jim Rickards: Dynamics in Place for $10,000 Gold
  Jim Rickards has been predicting $10,000 gold. Recently, he appeared on CNBC’s Squawk Box and stuck to that prediction, saying the dynamics are in place for gold to reach that $10,000 mark. Rickards said he thinks we are at the beginning of an extended gold bull market, possibly similar to the late 1990s when the price of the yellow metal went up 615% over a 12-year period. He conceded gold can be volatile, so he doesn’t pay as much attention to short-term fluctuations in price. But he did note an interesting fact in the wake of the recent price jumps after some major world events.
• To The Mattress: Fund Manager Cash Levels Highest In 15 Years
  Despite the post-Brexit market rally, fund managers have gotten even more wary of taking risks. The S&P 500 has jumped about 8.5 percent since the lows hit in the days after Britain’s move to leave the European Union, but that hasn’t assuaged professional investors. Cash levels are now at 5.8 percent of portfolios, up a notch from June and at the highest levels since November 2001, according to the latest Bank of America Merrill Lynch Fund Manager Survey. In addition to putting money under the mattress, investors also are looking for protection, with equity hedging at its highest level in the survey’s history.
• The financial system is breaking down at an unimaginable pace
  Now it’s $13 trillion. That’s the total amount of government bonds in the world that have negative yields, according to calculations published last week by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Given that there were almost zero negative-yielding bonds just two years ago, the rise to $13 trillion is incredible. In February 2015, the total amount of negative-yielding debt in the world was ‘only’ $3.6 trillion. A year later in February 2016 it had nearly doubled to $7 trillion. Now, just five months later, it has nearly doubled again to $13 trillion, up from $11.7 trillion just over two weeks ago.
• Bubble Finance At Work——65%-70% Of Households Have Lower Real Incomes Than In 2005
  A new study from McKinsey looks at the cross-generational distribution of income as a form of new ‘inequality’, in words of the authors: “an aspect of inequality that has received relatively little attention, perhaps because prior to the 2008 financial crisis less than 2 percent of households in advanced economies were worse off than similar households in previous years. That has now changed: two-thirds of households in the United States and Western Europe were in segments of the income distribution whose real market incomes in 2014 were flat or had fallen compared with 2005.”In other words, McKinsey folks are looking at the “proportion of households in advanced economies with flat or falling incomes” – the generational cohorts that are no better than their predecessors.
• Erdogan’s Staged Coup Has Resulted In A Purge Of 50,000 Teachers, Judges, Soldiers And Government Officials
  Barack Obama’s “friend” in Turkey is a deeply corrupt radical Islamist dictator that has just staged a coup to consolidate his grip on power.  As I have reported previously, 1,845 “journalists, writers and critics” have been arrested for “insulting” President Erdogan over just the past two years, and a couple of years ago he had a monstrous 1,100 room presidential palace built for himself that is 30 times larger than the White House.  With each passing day, more evidence emerges which seems to indicate that the recent “coup” was a staged event meant to enable Erdogan and his allies to eliminate their enemies and solidify their stranglehold over the nation.  At this point the number of victims of “Erdogan’s purge” has hit 50,000, but the final number will not be known for quite some time.
• The man who accurately predicted 4 market crashes told us the dates when oil prices will fall again
  The man who accurately predicted four market crashes to the exact date recently told Business Insider about his calendar prediction for when oil prices would start to significantly slump again. Sandy Jadeja is a technical analyst and chief market strategist at Core Spreads. Technical analysts look at charts to pinpoint patterns in various markets and asset classes. From that they forecast which direction prices are likely to move. They can't tell you why there will be a big market movement, only that there will be one. He says there is a specific time period to watch out for.
• Financial System Held Together with Bailing Wire & Chewing Gum-Craig Hemke
  Financial and precious metals expert Craig Hemke contends profits in the stock market, in the past few years, came with extreme hidden risk. Hemke explains, “I know why I own precious metal and am continuing to buy it, and that is what I am telling people to do.  I mean the price has fallen for totally uneconomic reasons, manipulation being one . . . but anyway, I have used that weakness the last three or four years to keep buying.  So, now with this recovery, all of my metal on a cost basis is less than what the current price is.  That’s worked out quite well.  I am not going to argue with anybody that says you should have sold all your gold in 2011, with the benefit of hindsight, and you should have bought the S&P.  You would have made 100%, and hey, knock yourself out.  The reason I didn’t attempt to do that is knowing full well anytime between 2011 and today I could have woken up and the whole system could have blown up. That’s how fragile it is.  It’s all held together with bailing wire and chewing gum.”
• The Entire Market is Being Driven by a “Once in History” Asset Bubble About to Burst 
  Since QE 3 ended in October 2014, stocks have traded in a large range between roughly 2,130 and 1800 on the S&P 500. During this time, whenever stocks began to breakdown in a serious way, a clear intervention was staged in which someone manipulated the markets higher. Regardless of whether you are a bull or a bear, none of those rallies felt normal or sane in any way. No one panic buys every single day at the exact same time for days on end. Which brings us to today. Stocks have broken out of the trading range to the upside hitting new all-time highs.
• We’re witnessing a complete breakdown in western values
  Two months ago I was with the former President of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, at his home outside of Medellin. He was telling me some hilarious stories about his interactions in the early 2000s with Hugo Chavez, who had recently seized power in Venezuela. Chavez was a fanatic socialist. He believed so strongly in the idea of redistributing wealth from rich to poor. Yet even when it was clear his policies weren’t working and Venezuela was rapidly sliding into economic chaos, Chavez’s only solution was to double down and redistribute even MORE wealth. It was the classic definition of insanity. Chavez failed to understand what Uribe told me so succinctly: “If there’s no wealth creation, there’s nothing left to redistribute.”
• Axe-Wielding Terrorist Attacks Train Passengers In Germany And A Police Car Is Firebombed In Florida
  Crazy people committing random acts of senseless violence is rapidly becoming the “new normal” in the western world.  On Monday, a police vehicle was firebombed in Daytona, Florida by someone that was enraged by the recent shooting deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile.  And over in Europe, an axe-wielding Islamic terrorist shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he started wildly attacking passengers on a train in southern Germany.  Authorities say that the young man was originally from Afghanistan, and according to the Mirror he was shot dead before he could flee the scene of the attack…
• Baton Rouge, Nice, Dallas, Orlando – A Dark And Distressing Time Has Descended Upon The Civilized World
  Does it not seem as though events are starting to accelerate significantly?  Since I warned that something “had shifted” and that things had “suddenly become more serious“, we have seen the worst mass shooting in U.S. history in Orlando, we have seen the massacre of five police officers in Dallas, we have seen the horrifying terror rampage in Nice, and now we have seen the brutal murder of three police officers in Baton Rouge.  On Sunday morning, the peace and quiet in Baton Rouge were shattered when “dozens of shots” erupted less than one mile from police headquarters.  By the end of it, 29-year-old Gavin Eugene Long had killed three officers and seriously wounded three others.  It was a crime fueled by pure hatred, and Long specifically waited for his 29th birthday to launch the attack…
• End of an Era: The Rise and Fall of the Petrodollar System
  The intricate relationship between energy markets and our global financial system, can be traced back to the emergence of the petrodollar system in the 1970s, which was mainly driven by the rise of the United States as an economic and political superpower. For almost twenty years, the U.S. was the world’s only exporter of petroleum. Its relative energy independence helped support its economy and its currency. Until around 1970, the U.S. enjoyed a positive trade balance. Oil expert and author of the book “The Trace of Oil”, Bertram Brökelmann, explains a dramatic change took place in the U.S. economy, as it experienced several transitions: First, it transitioned from being an oil exporter to an oil importer, then a goods importer and finally a money importer. This disastrous downward spiral began gradually, but it ultimately affected the global economy. A petrodollar is defined as a US dollar that is received by an oil producing country in exchange for selling oil. As is shown in the chart below, the gap between US oil consumption and production began to expand in the late 1960s, making the U.S. dependent on oil imports.
• The Helicopter Has Already Been Tested – And It Failed Spectacularly
  Most of what passes for modern monetary policy is nothing more than one assumption piled upon another (and then another, and so on). Taken for granted for so long, rarely are these unproven precepts ever challenged to justify themselves to the minimal standard of internal consistency, let alone prove discrete validity by parts. The latest is “helicopter money”, another sham in a long line of them proffered by at least one central bank today because it knows, as the others, nothing they have done has worked. The fact that the world is even discussing the helicopter option should instill great skepticism as a first impulse, not more rabid faith. The way this latest scheme is being described is exactly the same as quantitative easing was really not that long ago. Clearly the expectation for it is rising, as Bloomberg reported today that, “Nearly one-third of clients and colleagues surveyed by Citigroup Inc. think that so-called helicopter money could be on its way within a fortnight.” Forty-three percent in the same survey believed that the “market” was expecting it.
• The entire financial system is exposed to this junk bond market
  Japan got there first. 15 years ago, we met a Japanese equity manager who made an astonishing prediction: “Japan was the dress rehearsal. The rest of the world will be the main event.” That seemed an extraordinary suggestion 15 years ago. Today, not so much. In the aftermath of the late 1980s real estate and stock market bubble, and its subsequent banking crisis, Japan became a giant laboratory experiment for novel insane monetary policies. In 2001 the Bank of Japan tried Quantitative Easing. It was a policy that Richard Koo of the Nomura Research Institute described as the “greatest monetary non-event”. It turned out, not for the first time, that academic economists had it all wrong.
• “The World's Central Banks Are Making A Big Mistake”
  While everyone was talking about Brexit last month, the Bank for International Settlements released its 86th annual report. Based in Basel, Switzerland, the BIS functions as a master hub for all the world’s central banks. It settles transactions among central banks and other international organizations. It doesn’t serve private individuals, businesses, or national governments. Because it is relatively free from political considerations, the BIS can speak about economic issues more directly than its member central banks can. And its candor has grown steadily in recent years. When central bankers like Janet Yellen or Mario Draghi speak, we have to discount their statements because they have policy agendas to promote. While the BIS has an agenda, too, the bank isn’t tied to any particular economy or government. Its analysts are paying attention to how the world functions in toto.
• Unexpected Gasoline Inventory Build, Production Rise Spark Crude Chaos
  Following last week's surprise Distillates build (and bounce in production) and API's overnight surprise Gasoline build, DOE data this morning was mixed confirming the 2.3mm draw in overall crude inventories (9th weekin a row) but surpringly large builds in both Cushing and Gasoline inventories (expectations were for draws). Oil prices were chaotic – running stops high and low – as algos noted crude production also rose (for the 2nd week in a row).
• Another Bad Month For Truck Shipping
  Truck shipments were up in June from May. So were expenditures. That sounds pretty good, but it really isn’t. Shipments are normally up in June and the Cass Freight Index report from which I get numbers is not seasonally adjusted. The best way to compare June is to prior years, and that picture isn’t pretty.
• Brexit: UK economy yet to suffer slowdown following EU vote, says Bank of England
  The Bank of England is yet to see any clear evidence of an economic downturn due to Britain's decision to vote in favour of leaving the European Union, although hiring and investments were being put on hold. Business uncertainty has “risen markedly” in the four weeks following the EU referendum, but there was no evidence that consumers had reined in their spending, the BoE's regional agents said on Wednesday (20 July). “A majority of firms spoken with did not expect a near-term impact from the result on their investment or staff-hiring plans,” Britain's central bank said in a statement.
• Why Growing Food is The Single Most Impactful Thing You Can Do in a Rigged Political System
  The most effective change-makers in our society aren’t waiting around for a new president to make their lives better, they’re planting seeds, quite literally, and through the revolutionary act of gardening, they’re rebuilding their communities while growing their own independence. Every four years when the big election comes around, millions of people put their passion for creating a better world into an increasingly corrupt and absurd political contest. What if that energy was instead invested in something worthwhile, something that directly and immediately improved life, community, and the world at large? The simple act of growing our own food directly challenges the control matrix in many authentic ways, which is why some of the most forward-thinking and strongest-willed people are picking up shovels and defiantly starting gardens. It has become much more of a meaningful political statement than supporting political parties and candidates.
• Japan, Helicopter Money, Cold Fusion And The Disastrous Endgame
  With continued wild trading this summer in global markets, it’s all about Japan, helicopter money, cold fusion and the disastrous endgame. Overnight markets were all higher and the world was once again a-twitter over the concept of “helicopter money.” But once again, the pundits and the press are getting the descriptions wrong. Just like they talk about minimal inflation rates as “deflation” because they are scared of a depression, which is what they think deflation means, or refer to a 20% move as a bull or bear market, they are now mindlessly labeling the next step in monetary debasement as helicopter money…
• Renewable Energy Investment Drops By Nearly A Quarter
  As the cost of installing solar panels waned and China pressed pause on its spending, global investment in renewable energy sunk 23 percent in the first half of 2016. According to London-based Bloomberg New Energy Finance, solar, wind, and other clean-energy industries engrossed $116.4 billion in the first two-quarters of the year 2016. This included $61.5 in the second quarter. The research company said it also reviewed up 2015’s total by practically $20 billion to a record of $348.5 billion.
• How & by How Much Big Pharma Fools Investors
  Yesterday, we were bashing big pharmaceutical companies for jacking up prices of patent-protected drugs at obscene rates. Those double-digit price increases were largely responsible for the sales increases these companies reported. Drugs have become the largest wholesale category, at $54.3 billion in May, or 12.2% of total wholesales. This boom is based on price increases at a great cost to US consumers and taxpayers. It’s cannibalizing the rest of the economy. But it’s made possible by the abuse of the patent system, the increasingly monopolistic structures in the industry after a tsunami of mergers funded by cheap credit and a soaring stock market – as planned by the Fed – along with legislators and regulators that have been compromised by the big money and the revolving door.
• Spain’s Banks are Suddenly “Too Broke To Fine”
  After eight years of chronic crisis mismanagement, moral hazard and perverse incentives have infected just about every part of the financial system. Earlier this week, the U.S. Congress published the findings of a three-year investigation into why the Department of Justice chose not to punish HSBC and its executives for their violations of US anti-money laundering laws and related offenses – because doing so would have had “serious adverse consequences” for the financial system – the “Too Big To Jail” phenomenon, a perfect, all-purpose, real-world Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card. But now there’s “Too Broke to Fine.” Today over a dozen Spanish banks were given a life-line by the EU’s advocate general, Paolo Mengozzi, that could be worth billions of euros in savings for the banks. For millions of Spanish mortgage holders, it could mean billions of euros in lost compensation.
• Is Pokemon Go Evil, Dangerous Or Demonic?
  One week ago, a game called Pokemon Go was launched, and over the last seven days it has become an international phenomenon. It is the first mass market video game to successfully blend the real world and the digital world together in a way that the public truly embraces, and it is making headlines all over the planet. At this point it has almost as many daily active users as Twitter does, and Nintendo’s stock price is going crazy as a result. On Monday it shot up 25 percent, and on Tuesday it surged another 13 percent. In other words, Nintendo is now worth billions of dollars more than it used to be. But is there a dark side to Pokemon Go? Is it potentially evil, dangerous or demonic?
• 2067: The end of the oil age
  The fear of losing a market share makes the oil countries play the oil price wars, glut the market while the low prices reducing investments in the new oil reserves exploration for the second year. The world proved oil reserves increased by only 2.5 times up to 1.7 trillion barrels during active crude oil production for the past 35 years. It seems that the major crude oil producing countries, which are so keen on a price war, forgot that in reality the oil runs out very quickly. For better understanding: 1.7 trillion barrels of oil with a production of 90 million barrels per day are approximately as the Indian Ocean from which two Gulfs of Mexico are scooped out every year. According to the simplest calculations, it seems the current world’s oil proved reserves at a current production level will suffice for 50 years. By that time it will be possible to find industrial raw commodity to replace the oil in the cycle of production of goods, find and widely implement a cost-effective energy analogue. But in reality it is not so smooth.
• The Energy “Death List”: Who’s On It and Who’s Next?
  In June, Warren Resources filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The Houston-based company was just another one added to the group of 150 North American industry filings over the last year and a half since the oil decline started. Warren Resources could also be found in the 2015 publication of an “oil company death list” put out by Oxford Club investors’ network out of Baltimore. 19 companies were accused of “toxic” debt-to-equity ratios on the list. Since it was published, eight of the companies on the list have filed for protection, another was purchased at a low price, and few still are trying to keep their head above water.
• EU Looks To Break Baltic Dependence on Russian Energy
  After EU-member states agreed on a Commission proposal, the EU will invest €263 million in key gas and electricity projects across the Union with primary focus on the Baltic Sea region. The European Commission announced on Friday (15 July) in a press release that the 28 member states agreed to invest €263 million in trans-European energy infrastructure projects. The biggest share of the support will be destined to the Baltic Sea region to help the expansion of the gas infrastructure, meanwhile the other part of the investment will support the electricity sector across the European Union.
• The Global Oil Glut Gets Uglier – Forget the Recovery and “Rebalancing” Hype
  Deal makers in the oil patch of the US and Canada are smelling the fees, and they’re firing up the machinery. In the first half of the year, there were 52 pending and completed acquisitions of oil & gas exploration & production companies valued at $100 million or more, for a total of $30 billion, Fitch Ratings reported today: “The rise in transaction volume seems to be largely due to the improvement in hydrocarbon prices, including the tightening of bid/ask spreads, and access to capital markets.” The global oil market is “rebalancing” with production falling and demand rising, the meme goes. In anticipation, prices have bounced off the lows in February, with WTI soaring from $26.19 a barrel to $51.23 by June 8. So this would be the great oil price recovery.
• Great American Oil Bust Rages on; Defaults, Bankruptcies Soar – How much worse is 2016 than 2015?
  Junk bonds, trading like stocks since February, have skyrocketed and yields have plunged. But that doesn’t mean the bloodletting is over. The trailing 12-month US high-yield bond default rate jumped to 4.9% at the end of June, the highest since May 2010 as the Financial Crisis was winding down, Fitch Ratings reported today. The first-half total of $50.2 billion of defaults already exceeds the $48.3 billion for the entire year 2015. Energy companies accounted for 56% of those defaults. The energy sector default rate shot up to 15%. Within it, the default rate of the Exploration & Production (E&P) sub-sector soared to 29%! And the default party isn’t over: “Despite the run-up in prices since the February trough, there will be additional sector defaults, with Halcon Resources expected to file imminently,” Fitch reported.
• Stocks Will Crash – and Crush (California’s) Pension Funds & Taxpayers: Report
  The California Policy Center published an interesting study – “interesting” in all kinds of ways, including its outline of the doom-and-gloom future of California’s state and local pension plans if stocks turn down sharply, preceded by its prediction that stocks will turn down sharply because valuations are totally unsustainable. The huge, simultaneous, Fed-engineered rallies in stocks, bonds, and real estate – typically the three biggest holdings of state and local pension funds in the US – have inflated the balance sheets of these funds, thus elegantly, if only partially, papering over their fundamental problems. Most of these funds have a similar doom-and-gloom future when the asset bubbles get pulled out from under them. Plenty of pension funds don’t even need a market correction: they’re already in serious trouble despite the asset bubbles.
• China Is About To Shock The World And The Global Financial System
  On the heels of the Dow hitting new all-time highs and the U.S. dollar surging, China is about to shock the world and the global financial system. Stephen Leeb:  “Global turmoil keeps ratcheting up. Just when you think it couldn’t get any worse, it does. The attempted military coup in Turkey is the latest eruption, following on the heels of yet another massacre in France. Syria remains an ongoing nightmare while terrorist bombings in Iraq are so commonplace they barely register…
• End Time Persecution Is Here: Russia Just Banned Evangelism And China Has Torn Down 1000s Of Crosses
  We always knew that this was coming.  For years, the horrifying persecution of Christians in the Middle East has made headlines all over the globe, but now we are seeing very disturbing examples of government-sanctioned persecution literally all over the planet.  As you will read about below, Russia just banned virtually all types of evangelism outside of a church or religious site.  And China has been tearing down thousands of crosses and has been demolishing dozens of churches in a renewed crackdown on the growth of Christianity in that nation.  Overall, there are 53 countries that now have laws that restrict the Christian faith according to one recent report.  When are we going to wake up and realize what is happening?
• America Wastes About HALF The Food That It Produces While Hunger Runs Rampant Around The Globe
  Is the United States the most wasteful nation on the entire planet?  We are all certainly guilty of wasting food.  Whether it is that little bit that you don’t want to eat at the end of a meal, or that produce that you forgot about in the back of the refrigerator that went moldy, the truth is that we could all do better at making sure that good food does not get wasted.  It can be tempting to think that wasting food is not a big deal because we have so much of it, but an increasing number of people around the world are really hurting these days.  In fact, it has been estimated that there are more than a billion hungry people around the globe right now.  So as a society we need to figure out how to waste a whole lot less food and how to get it into the mouths of those that really need it.
• US & Clinton Beyond the Law-Catherine Austin Fitts
  Financial expert and former Assistant Secretary of Housing, Catherine Austin Fitts, says the U.S. government’s actions with Hillary Clinton means it is more lawless than ever. Fitts explains, “The entire country now looks like Arkansas . . . we’ve all turned into Mena, Arkansas, now. It’s pretty tragic. I have watched for two decades while 80% of the federal budget and federal credit has been run outside the Constitution and the laws related to financial management. I have never seen anything as blatant and outrageous as Loretta Lynch, prior to Hillary Clinton’s interview with the FBI, meeting with her disbarred husband, who is either the husband of or the target of a criminal investigation, and basically briefing him, I am assuming and what I believe on what Hillary needs to know, so she can skate the (FBI) interview. What the President, Lynch and Comey don’t want is the investigative team recommending to indict. . . . If you know anything about civil or criminal procedures, this is so beyond the law. This is so over the top that I have never seen anything more outrageous. It’s beginning to look like Mena, Arkansas, during the Mena drug running.”
• Those That Wanted To Get Prepared Have Already Gotten Prepared By Now
  Is the time for warning people to prepare for what is ahead coming to an end?  For years, bold men and women all over America have been sounding the alarm and warning people to get prepared physically, financially, mentally, emotionally and spiritually for the great storm that is rapidly approaching.  Personally, I have written more than 2,500 articles on my primary two websites combined, and so nobody can accuse me of not blowing the trumpet.  It has gotten to the point that sometimes I am even tired of listening to myself warn the people.  But now we are shifting into a new phase.
• The Dow And The S&P 500 Soar To Brand New All-Time Record Highs – How Is This Possible?
  The Dow and the S&P 500 both closed at all-time record highs on Tuesday, and that is very good news.  You might think that is an odd statement coming from the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, but the truth is that I am not at all eager to see the financial system crash and burn.  We all saw what took place when it happened in 2008 – millions of people lost their jobs, millions of people lost their homes, and economic suffering was off the charts.  So no, I don’t want to see that happen again any time soon.  All of our lives will be a lot more comfortable if the financial markets are stable and stocks continue to go up.  If the Dow and the S&P 500 can keep on soaring, that will suit me just fine.  Unfortunately, I don’t think that is going to be what happens.
• More Islamic Terror in France, Black Lives Matter is False Narrative, Phony Stock Market Highs
  France has been hit once again by Islamic terror–this time in Nice. The French Riviera town was struck during Bastille Day celebrations by a terrorist who used a truck to mow down dozens of people.  French media says ISIS is claiming responsibility for the heinous crime. The USA Today keeps propelling false narratives with the “Black Lives Matter” (BLM) movement and helping out the Democratic presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton with what can only be described as biased one-sided reporting. “Black Lives Matter” has been described as “racist” by former NYC Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.   This week, the USA Today staff put a picture on the front page with a BLM protester that read “Killer cops make cop Killers.”  BLM basically claims white police officers are hunting down black men and murdering them on purpose.  This is a total lie, and is refuted by a brand new study from Harvard. USA Today would not comment on the editorial decision of the newspaper to put forth a totally false narrative.
• War Is Coming And The Global Financial Situation Is A Lot Worse Than You May Think
  On the surface, things seem pretty quiet in mid-July 2016.  The biggest news stories are about the speculation surrounding Donald Trump’s choice of running mate, the stock market in the U.S. keeps setting new all-time record highs, and the media seems completely obsessed with Taylor Swift’s love life.  But underneath the surface, it is a very different story.  As you will see below, the conditions for a “perfect storm” are coming together very rapidly, and the rest of 2016 promises to be much more chaotic than what we have seen so far.
• Defence giant says UK could be more attractive to invest post-Brexit vote
  One of the world’s largest defence contractors has said that the UK could become a more attractive place to invest, after Brits voted to leave the European Union. Marillyn Hewson, the chief executive of Lockheed Martin, told the Sunday Times that the weaker pound could make exporting from Britain more lucrative. Lockheed builds gun turrets for the UK’s Ajax and Warrior tanks at its factory in Bedfordshire, which it hopes to export to other countries. It’s also the main contractor for Britain’s plans to buy 138 F-35 fighter jets for the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy. Hewson added that the UK’s attractiveness as a place to invest post-Brexit vote would depend “”on the government and the policies its puts in place”.
• Why Italy's banking crisis will shake the eurozone to its core
  They call them le sofferenze – the suffering. The imagery is striking, the thousands of sofferenze across Italy, unwanted and ignored, a problem unsolved. But despite the emotional name, these are not people. They are loans. Bad debts, draining banks of profits and undermining economic growth. The name is less clinical than the English term “non-performing loans”, a reflection of the Italian authorities’ emotional rather than business-like approach to the problem. None the less, the loans are indeed causing real suffering. The €360bn (£300bn) of sofferenze from Italian banks show borrowers are weighed down with debts they cannot afford, while the banks are struggling to offer new credit to the households and firms that need them.
• UK Opens ‘Very Fruitful’ Trade Talks With Canada
  Britain opened “very fruitful” trade talks with Canada on Friday, International Trade Secretary Liam Fox told the Sunday Times newspaper as he prepares to renegotiate Britain's commercial ties following its vote last month to leave the European Union. In limited extracts of his interview, Fox said he would soon travel to the United States to ensure that Britain was not at the back of the queue in trade talks as President Barack Obama had suggested before the June 23 vote. He said was “scoping” about a dozen free trade deals outside the EU to be ready for when Britain leaves, some with countries that had indicated they wanted a quick deal and others with some of the world's major economies.
• Middle East: The Rest of the Story
  Want to know what is really happening in the Middle East? Pastor Lindsey Williams created a 3-DVD set entitled “Middle East: The rest of the Story” and it includes topics: “Future Price of Crude Oil”, “Future Price of Gasoline and Diesel”, “Future Grocery Prices”, “Explosive Growth to US Crude Production”, “China and the US”, “The Future of Islam”, “Riots in the Middle East”. This 3-DVD set is very important if you want to know what is happening right now in the Middle East.
• “This Is Going To Get Very Ugly” – Former Top CIA Officer Says “Obama Has Lost Control Of The Middle East”
  With Thursday's tragic mass killing by a resclusive, truck-driving Tunisian maniac in Nice having been violently drowned out by the frentic late Friday news of a failed (and perhaps staged) coup in Turkey, the news cycle has once again shifted its attention away from a far greater threat to the global economy than whether Erdogan can concentrate even more power in his grasp. Namely, both lone-wolf and organized terrorism in Europe (and elsewhere). And according to at least one CIA field commander, Gary Bernsten, it is all Obama's fault. As the Hill reports, the decorated former CIA career officer who served in the Directorate of Operations between October 1982 and June 2005, said on Friday that Obama has lost control of the Middle East following attacks in France that left at least 84 dead.  “This is going to get very, very ugly,” Gary Bernsten said on Fox & Friends Friday.
• Turkish Central Bank Pledges “Unlimited Liquidity” On Bank Run Fears: Wall Street's Take
  Late on Friday afternoon, just as the market was closing and news of the Turkish coup spread, Turkish ETFs tumbled and the Lira dropped the most in 8 years on investor concerns about the future of the country, and a spike in social media reports that local depositors were – understandably – pulling their money from banks, potentially sparking a bank run. The Turkish Lira losses added to its woes after having slid 20% last year; the currency has now lost more than 40% of its value since the end of 2012. And while the (allegedly staged) coup has been put down, questions remained about the stability of the Turkish financial system. Which is why early today, Turkey’s central bank held an extraordinary meeting with bank executives to discuss ways to minimize the market impact of the coup attempt. The bank convened members of the Banks Association of Turkey, and shortly after announced a series of steps which, comparable to the post-Brexit reaction, sought to stabilize risk assets.
• Morgan Stanley: “To Make Up For A 10% Drop In The S&P, Treasury Yields Would Need To Go… Negative”
  With both the S&P500 and Treasury prices hitting record highs as recently as one week ago, many have been confused (perhaps none more so than Goldman's clients as we reported yesterday), although the conventional fallback explanation that has again emerged, is a reversion back to the “Fed Model” according to which the lower yields go, the highest equity multiples should (and may) rise. As a bearish Goldman explained, “bullish investors argue that sustained low rates will support P/E multiples of 20x or more. The Fed Model relates the earnings yield (5.7%) to the Treasury yield (1.5%). The current 420 bp yield gap is near the 10-year average. Exhibit 2 shows the sensitivity of this model. Assuming a steady bond yield, reversion to the 35-year average gap of 250 bp implies a S&P 500 year-end level of 3075 while the 5-year average gap implies 1900.”  For the record, Goldman is not a fan of a 3,000+ S&P target, and instead expects the market to drop in the coming months.
• “The Credit Ponzi Is Dead” – Brexit Or Not, The Pound Will Crash
  Status quo, as our generation know it, established in 1945 has plodded along ever since. It is true that it have had near death experiences several times, especially in August 1971 when the world almost lost faith in the global reserve currency and in 2008 when the fractional reserve Ponzi nearly consumed itself. While the recent Brexit vote seem to be just another near death experience we believe it says something more fundamental about the world. When the 1945 new world order came into existence, its architects built it on a shaky foundation based on statists Keynesian principles. It was clearly unsustainable from the get-go, but as long as living standards rose, no one seemed to notice or care. The global elite managed to resurrect a dying system in the 1970s by giving its people something for nothing. Debt accumulation collateralized by rising asset values became a substitute for productivity and wage increases. While people could no longer afford to pay for their health care, education, house or car through savings they kept on voting for the incumbents (no, there is no difference between center left and right) since friendly bankers were more than willing to make up the difference.
• Why the Gold Price is Rising, and Why it will Continue to do so
  Do you remember last year, when an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal referred to gold as nothing more than a ‘pet rock’? At the time, gold was trading for around US$1,130 an ounce. A year later, gold is trading around US$1,350 an ounce (up around 20%), while the S&P 500 is up only a few percent, despite closing at another record high today, at 2137 points. The author of that article, Jason Zweig, returned last week in his regular Intelligent Investor column to defend his pet rock call. While he acknowledged some important reasons for gold’s enduring allure, he trotted out some pretty lame reasons for sticking with his 2015 call that gold is basically just a rock.
• Gold Has Important Place in Investment Portfolio as Paper Currency Wanes
  On Tuesday we got not especially coherent statements from three Federal Reserve bank Presidents. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard was dismissive of the impact of the UK referendum on the U.S. and yes, directly, the UK doesn’t matter that much. What will matter will be the impact on the U.S. of slowing growth in the Eurozone. According to the IMF, growth will slow down as a consequence of the Referendum to 1.6 percent this year and 1.4 percent in 2017. Both years were revised down from 1.7 percent.
• New Stock Market Highs Correlate to $57 Trillion in Printed Global Currency Units
  When people use the term “money,” it usually refers to a unit of currency used in the transacting of business and commerce. A woman works cleaning houses for a week and gets paid in a number of currency units and then goes to the supermarket and exchanges those units for food or diapers or medicine. What is left over at the end of the pay period is called “savings,” which are allowed to accumulate receiving a modest rate of interest. Around the globe this weekend, a vast number of banks are offering negative returns on savings, such that keeping one's accumulated units of currency in the bank is penalized. The objective of this monetary experiment is to combat the global problem of deflation. Despite $57 trillion of new currency units having been printed since the 2009 financial crisis, global growth has been tepid at best because the velocity of “money” has remained moribund and since all collateral underpinning this massive global debt must not be allowed to depreciate, the central banks have been allowed to engage in a massive, coordinated reflation designed to jumpstart “money” velocity.
• Ignore Pullbacks As Top Analyst Says Gold To Hit New All-Time Highs, Plus A Shocking Chart
  With continued wild trading in global markets, one of the top analysts in the world says ignore pullbacks as price of gold to smash through all-time highs. There is also a shocking chart included in this fantastic piece. “Markets say the ECB is done, their box is empty… But we are magic people. Each time we take something and give to the markets – a rabbit out of the hat.” — Vitas Vasiliasukas, member of the ECB’s Governing Council. Today King World News is featuring a piece by a man whose recently released masterpiece has been praised around the world, and also recognized as some of the most unique work in the gold market.  Below is the latest exclusive KWN piece by Ronald-Peter Stoeferle of Incrementum AG out of Liechtenstein.
• Gold Price of $1,400 is just the Start – Vaneck
  Although gold prices are down from last week’s two-year high, one investment firm sees $1,400 an ounce as just the start as the market remains in a new bull uptrend. In a report released Tuesday, Joe Foster, gold strategist at VanEck, said that the firm is expecting gold prices to reach $1,400 an ounce in the second half of the year, adding “and we do not believe it will end there.” Tuesday, August gold futures have seen renewed selling pressure with prices last trading at $1,336.50 an ounce, down almost 1.5% on the day. What is the driving the next leg of the renewed secular bull market is the fact that investors are being more proactive, he said. He added that inflows into gold-backed exchange-traded products are at their highest level since 2009, when investors sought out safe-haven assets during the sub-prime credit crisis.
• The IRS wants a Piece of Your Gold and Silver Profits: Here's what You Need to Tell Them… And What You Don't
  With gold and silver gaining popularity as safe haven assets during economic crisis there is a strong possibility that we’ll see prices go to all-time highs in the future. With those price increases will come windfall profits for investors. And, as you already know, where there’s profit, there’s a government with its hands in your pocket trying to get a piece of the action.
• Did Citi Just Confiscate $1 Billion In Venezuela Gold
  Just over a year ago, cash-strapped Venezuela quietly conducted a little-noticed gold-for-cash swap with Citigroup as part of which Maduro converted part of his nation's gold reserves into at least $1 billion in cash through a swap with Citibank. As Reuters reported then, the deal would make more foreign currency available to President Nicolas Maduro's socialist government as the OPEC nation struggles with soaring consumer prices, chronic shortages and a shrinking economy worsened by low oil prices. Needless to say, the socialist country's economic situation is orders of magnitude worse now. According to El Nacional, “the deal was for $1 billion and was struck with Citibank, which is owned by Citigroup.”
• Venezuela army deployed to control food production and distribution
  Venezuela's military has taken control of five ports in an effort to guarantee supplies of food and medicine. In a decree, President Nicolas Maduro has ordered the army to monitor food processing plants, and co-ordinate the production and distribution of items. Venezuela is going through a deep economic crisis despite having the world's largest oil reserves. Basic products are increasingly hard to find and many say they struggle to feed their families. The Venezuelan Bishops Conference said the rise of the military is a “threat to tranquillity and peace”. Mr Maduro says the measure is to fight the “economic war” he claims is being waged against his government by political foes and businessmen, with US backing. But the opposition says the government has mismanaged the economy, and has called for a referendum to oust the president.
• Energy Failures Push U.S. High-Yield Default Rate to 6-Year High
  U.S. high-yield bonds in default reached the highest levels in at least six years as more energy companies buckled under pressure from stagnant oil prices. Speculative-grade U.S. defaults spiked to 5.1 percent of the total outstanding in the second quarter from 4.4 percent in the first, according to a July 12 report from Moody’s Investors Service. The global high-yield default rate could finish the year at 4.9 percent, with the U.S. as much as 6.4 percent, Moody’s said.
• There’s a war on its way, and it will make Iraq look like child’s play
  War is on many people’s minds at the moment. But whilst most of the public are focused on wars of the past after the release of the Chilcot report, our leaders are plotting one for the future. And, if their rhetoric is anything to go by, it’s going to be on a scale we have never seen before. So, where’s the media flurry? Or the political fire being shot across the Commons over the issue? It’s nowhere to be seen. And that glaring oversight, or purposeful omission, could be what lets us sleepwalk into World War III.
• Theresa May’s husband is a senior executive at a $1.4tn investment fund that profits from tax avoiding companies
  The relatively unknown investment fund where Theresa May’s husband Philip works as a senior executive is one of the world’s largest and most powerful financial institutions, controlling $1.4 trillion in assets. Its portfolio also includes $20 billion of shares in Amazon and Starbucks, both of which were cited by the Prime Minister-designate in her pledge to crack down on tax avoidance yesterday. Latest filings to US authorities show that Los Angeles based Capital Group owns huge stakes in a variety of companies, including investment bank JP Morgan Chase, defence giant Lockheed Martin, tobacco company Philip Morris International, the pharmaceutical sector’s Merck & Co, and also Ryanair.
• Russian leader sacks EVERY commander in his Baltic fleet after ‘they refused to confront Western ships’
  RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin has taken a page out of Joseph Stalin’s book — and sacked every commander in his Baltic fleet. As many as 50 senior officers including a Vice Admiral have been purged by Vladimir Putin amid reports they refused to confront Western ships. Other Russian news sites also speculated that attempts to cover up a crash between a Russian sub and a Polish boat may have been behind the bloodletting. But given the endemic nature of corruption and incompetence across the Russian military, Western analysts are scratching their heads as to the real reason behind the purge.
• Gestapo America — Paul Craig Roberts
  FBI Director James Comey got Hillary off the hook but wants to put you on it. He is pushing hard for warrantless access to all of your Internet activity. Comey, who would have fit in perfectly with Hitler’s Gestapo, tells Congress that the United States is not safe unless the FBI knows when every American goes online, to whom they are sending emails and from whom they are receiving emails, and knows every website visited by every American. In other words, Comey wants to render null and void the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution and completely destroy your privacy rights. The reason Washington wants to know everything about everyone is so that Washington can embarrass, blackmail, and frame on felony charges patriots who stand up in defense of the US Constitution and the rule of law, and dissidents who criticize Washington’s illegal wars, reckless foreign policies, and oppression of American citizens.
• Millions Wiped Off Commercial Property Market
  The scale of damage to Britain's commercial property market by Brexit has been laid bare by new figures showing prices have fallen and millions of pounds of deals have collapsed. According to industry insiders, one in three major property investment deals has fallen through in the wake of Britain's vote to leave the EU. Prices across Britain's commercial property market, which includes office blocks, shopping centres and workplaces, are estimated to have fallen by 10-15% in the days after the vote. And an estimated £500m worth of so-called “Brexit clauses” have been triggered, meaning ongoing deals to buy and sell buildings have been cancelled or renegotiated.
• Some disturbing figures about the upcoming banking crisis
  In early 1870, the Kingdom of Prussia and French Empire were about to go to war. It was one of countless conflicts between the dozens of European kingdoms and empires throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, and this one was over before it even started. Prussia’s military might was legendary. They had recently beaten the pants off of Austria and Denmark, and they’d go on to neutralize or capture over 80% of French soldiers within a matter of months, while losing just 2% of their own. Very few wars have been so one-sided. And yet despite its nearly unparalleled military successes and clear dominance in European politics, Prussia lacked something critical: financial power.
• Russia passes ‘Big Brother' anti-terror laws
  Russia’s parliament has passed harsh anti-terrorism measures that human rights campaigners including the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden say will roll back personal freedoms and privacy. The lower house of parliament voted 325 to 1 on Friday to adopt the “Yarovaya law”, a package of amendments authored by the ruling United Russia party member Irina Yarovaya, who is known for previous legislative crackdowns on protesters and non-governmental organisations. Snowden, who has lived in Russia since receiving asylum in 2013, tweeted on Saturday that the “Big Brother law” was an “unworkable, unjustifiable violation of rights” that would “take money and liberty from every Russian without improving safety”.
• Robots will replace a quarter of business services workers by 2035, says Deloitte
  A quarter of jobs in Britain’s business services sector are at “high risk” of automation within the next two decades, according to a new report. Accountancy firm Deloitte warned that robots could replace a fifth of jobs in administrative roles such as telecoms and IT by 2035 as falling technology costs and rising wages make automation increasingly attractive. Deloitte said that around 3.3 million jobs could be classified as business services roles, and that of those, there was a “high chance” that 800,000 to one million jobs would no longer be performed by humans over the period.
• 90% Of June Job Gains Went To Workers 55 And Older
  While the algos have long forgotten about today's job report whose headline was good enough to unleash an epic buying spree which has pushed the S&P to the highest level since July 2015, a quick read between the lines reveals a continuation of some recent troubling trends, namely that all job gains in recent years have gone exclusively to the oldest segment of the population, those 55 and older. First, as the chart below shows, when breaking down the job additions by age group as per the Household Survey, of the 180K jobs added in this particular survey, 259,000 were in the 55 and over age group, while only 28,000 were added in the critical 25-54 age group. Young workers, those under 24, lost a collective 107,000 in June. In other words, 90% of all job gains in the month went to workers 55 and over.
• NRA: Restaurant performance weakens in May
  Restaurant sales softened in May, along with operator expectations, as the industry continued its choppy 2016, according to the latest Restaurant Performance Index from the National Restaurant Association. The monthly indication of the health of the industry fell 0.9 percent to 100.6 in May, from 101.6 in April. The NRA considers the industry to be in expansion mode if the index is above 100. “The RPI continued along a choppy trend line in May, with the index bouncing between moderate gains and losses in recent months,” Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of research for the NRA, said in a statement.
• Bill Gates And Other Billionaires Backing A Nuclear Renaissance
  Let’s for a second imagine a world without nuclear energy. That’s a tough one but let’s try. No nuclear bombs, of course, no Chernobyl and Fukushima, no worries about Iran and North Korea. A wonderful world, maybe? Probably not, because without nuclear energy we would have burned millions more tons of coal and billions more barrels of oil. This would have brought about climate change of such proportions that what we have today would have seemed negligible. Nuclear energy and uranium, which feeds it, are controversial enough even without any actual accident happening. Radioactivity is dangerous. Nobody is arguing against it. When an accident does take place, the public backlash is understandably huge. What many opponents of uranium forget to mention, however, are the benefits of nuclear energy and the fact that the statistical probability of serious accidents is pretty low. They focus on the “What if?” and neglect the other side of the coin. But let’s try to see both sides of the issue.
• Malls Push Out Department Stores
  At the Florida Mall in Orlando, Nordstrom was torn down and replaced with a Dick’s Sporting Goods store and a crayon-based family attraction called the Crayola Experience. The Saks Fifth Avenue was demolished, too, to make way for a dining pavilion with 23 restaurants. And Lord & Taylor was carved into space for American Girl, H&M, Forever 21 and Zara. Once the linchpin of American shopping malls, department stores are being displaced by newer types of retailers that do a better job of driving shoppers to the centers and lifting overall mall sales. Landlords are nudging out the once-coveted big box chains in favor of sporting-goods retailers, fast-fashion chains, supermarkets, gyms, restaurants, movies theaters and other types of entertainment as they seek to keep their properties relevant in an age increasingly dominated by online shopping.
• Who’s Most Afraid of Contagion from Italy’s Bank Meltdown? French and German banks
  Contagion is the reason Italy’s banking crisis is all of a sudden Europe’s biggest existential threat. Greece’s intractable problems are out of sight, out of mind; Brexit momentarily spooked investors and bankers; but Italy’s banking woes have the potential to wipe out investors and undo over 60 years of supranational state-building in Europe. The last few days have seen growing calls for taxpayer-funded state intervention, a practice that was supposed to have been consigned to the annals of history by Europe’s enactment of new bail-in rules on Jan 1, 2016. The idea behind the new legislation was simple: never again would taxpayers be left exclusively holding the tab for European banks’ insolvency issues while bondholders were getting bailed out. But even before the new rules have been tried out, they are about to be broken, or at least bent beyond all recognition.
• Congress: “Too Big to Jail: Inside the Obama Justice Department’s Decision Not to Hold Wall Street Accountable”
  The US House of Representatives today released the results of its three-year investigation – hampered along the way by the Department of Justice and the Department of the Treasury – into why HSBC and its executives weren’t prosecuted. Empirical evidence has told us for years that in the US a bank and its executives cannot be prosecuted if the bank is big enough. We’ve come to call this type of bank “Too Big to Jail.” Empirical evidence has also told us that a bank can do essentially whatever it wants to, given that, if caught, it may have to pay a fine that then becomes just part of the cost of doing business. Wall Street doesn’t care about fines. They’re “extraordinary items” that banks and analysts systematically exclude from their “ex-items” per-share earnings. Fines matter under GAAP reporting. But they don’t matter in the rosy picture that Wall Street paints of the banks. And so they don’t matter.
• Merchants Of War: U.S. Arms Export Reaches All-Time High At $47 Billion in FY 2015
  International demand for U.S. weapons systems is expected to continue growing in coming years, a senior U.S. Air Force official said on Sunday, citing strong interest in unmanned systems, munitions and fighter jets. “The appetite just keeps getting bigger and bigger,” U.S. Air Force Deputy Undersecretary Heidi Grant told Reuters in an interview on the eve of the Farnborough International Airshow. U.S. arms sales approved by the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency rose 36 percent to $46.6 billion in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, 2015, and are likely to remain strong this year, Grant said. Grant, the Air Force’s top international arms sales official, said she was working with many countries in eastern Europe and others that wanted to increase their defenses following Russia’s annexation of the Crimea region of Ukraine, but faced tough budget constraints.

In the year 1971 Lindsey Williams went to the state of Alaska to become an aviation missionary. Shortly after arriving in Alaska, Mr. Williams heard the oil companies were going to build the Trans-Alaska Oil pipeline and that 25,000 pipeliners were going to converge on the state to build it. Mr. Williams consequently volunteered his services as chaplain on the pipeline. Shortly after becoming chaplain, Alyeska Pipeline Service Company offered him executive status and invited him to sit in on their board meetings in an advisory capacity to help the relationship between management and labor. What he heard over the next three years time would change his life. He learned that OPEC had nothing to do with the price of oil but that the elite of the world controlled it. Mr. Williams knew he had to put into print what he saw and heard in order to inform the American people. His story is documented in The Energy Non Crisis.

From James Harkin (Webmaster & Editor of LindseyWilliams.net). Here is a summary of articles of interest from around the world for this week. Please LIKE the Lindsey Williams Online Facebook Page to see stories posted daily regarding the current state of the economy around the world.

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Latest News From July 8, 2016 to July 14, 2016:

• Global Economy Critical Condition Code Blue-Rob Kirby
  Macroeconomic analyst Rob Kirby says don’t trust the stock market’s rise to new all-time highs. The global economy is in terminal trouble, and Kirby explains, “My view of the financial system as it sits today is we are in an intensive care unit, and we have a lot of tubes and wires connected to us right now.  The question you are asking me is how long is a person in critical condition in an intensive care unit going to live?  I don’t really know the answer to it other than we could get a code blue any day. We could get a code blue tomorrow . . . code blue is when somebody has passed.”
• Gold has ‘unlimited upside' because the Fed is ‘confused' on policy: Trader
  Gold just posted its longest weekly winning streak since July 2011, but if investors missed out on the recent rally, fear not. One trader says the commodity has “unlimited upside,” and investors have the Federal Reserve to thank for it. On CNBC's “Futures Now” this week, Tom Colvin said that gold will remain in a bull market that will only come to an end “when central banks take their hands out of the cookie jar.” The Federal Reserve is unlikely to hike rates in the foreseeable future, despite a blockbuster June employment report on Friday.
• Peter Schiff Warns of the “Worst Economic Downturn Including the Great Depression”
  The Federal Reserve’s monetary policies have manufactured a “super bubble” that “…may give us the worst economic downturn including the Great Depression,” economist Peter Schiff declared during an interview with Accuracy in Media. Schiff is the CEO of Euro Pacific Capital, and a guest commentator on CNBC. He explained that low interest rates prop up the government’s feckless fiscal policies and generate “…really systemic structural problems in the economy…” that “manifest themselves in bubbles that then burst. …the Fed’s policy does not work and has not solved our problems, it has simply exacerbated our problems, and…we’re gonna have a currency crisis, we’re gonna have a sovereign debt crisis and it’ll make the financial crisis of ’08 really look like the Sunday school picnic,” he said.
• “The World Is Walking From Crisis To Crisis” – Why BofA Sees $1,500 Gold And $30 Silver
  With both stocks and US Treasury prices at all time highs the market is sensing that something has to give, and that something may just be more QE, which likely explains the move higher in gold to coincide with both risk and risk-haven assets. As of moments ago, gold rose above $1,370, and was back to levels not seen since 2014. Curiously, the move higher is taking place after Friday's “stellar” jobs report, suggesting that someone does not believe the seasonally-adjusted numbers goalseeked by the BLS. And while we reported last week that one way investors are rushing into the anti-QE safety of gold is by buying paper gold derivatves such as ETFs, which rose above 2,000 tons for the first time since 2013, many others have bypassed paper claims on gold such as GLD entirely, and are rushing into physical.
• 2016: The Big Shift
  As we close 2015 and begin a new year, the markets generally closed flat to neutral with a warning that as we approach the political year from hell (2017) that this is by no means going to be a walk through the park. We are more likely than not going to see some trends conclude in 2016 and others perform a false move to scare the hell out of everyone. Nevertheless, the stars may not be aligning, but the markets appear to be setting the stage to align for the BIG SHIFT. What does the BIG SHIFT mean? It means that as we face a meltdown in socialism, which has taken hold of western governments and destroyed our underlying democratic foundations, ALL assets must prepare for the HEDGE against government.
• The Federal Reserve's Grand Scheme Exposed (In 1 Simple Chart)
  For 138 years, consumer prices in America slightly declined. After The Federal Reserve was created, things changed… The ascent of the non-1% peaked when the Deep State forced Nixon to depart from the gold standard's constraint on largesse. Which should also clarify just why to the “1%”, including their protectors in the “developed market” central banking system, their tenured economist lackeys, their purchased politicians and their captured media outlets, the topic of a return to a gold standard is the biggest threat conceivable.
• Pension horror – as retirees get an eighth of what was predicted
  Pension savers, who opened with-profits policies in the 1990s, could receive a fraction of the cash they were told they'd get when they started saving. A report has revealed that some people who would told they could expect around £29,000 a year in retirement could in fact get just £3,774. Money Mail has published the figures, which have been caused by two crushing forces: with-profits disasters, and annuity pain.
• S&P 500 near record highs? Treasury yields at lows? Something’s gotta give
  It’s a tug of war between stocks and bonds, at least, it feels that way. The S&P 500 were on pace to surpass a record closing high of 2,130.82 on Monday as Treasury yields held at record lows. The sharp swing higher for stocks was sparked by a June jobs report that showed that the U.S. created 287,000 new jobs in June, quelling some of the nagging fears that the labor market was beginning to sputter after the May report showed a measly 38,000 jobs (later cut to 11,000) were added.
• Obama Pretty Much Shuts Down Offshore Drilling In Alaska
  The Obama administration announced new safety regulations Thursday that would place extremely strict limits on offshore drilling for oil and natural gas off the coast of Alaska. The New York Times reported the regulations, finalized by the Department of the Interior, are seen as intended to reduce investment and harm energy production in the region. The New York Times stated that the rules are “the latest in a series of Obama administration rules designed to slow the extraction of fossil fuels from American public lands and waters.”
• Lessons from the worst banking crisis in history
  It’s ironic that some of the most honest words to come out of a politician’s mouth were, “When it becomes serious you have to lie.” That was a quote from Jean-Claude Juncker, former Prime Minister of Luxembourg and President of the European Commission (the EU’s executive branch) in 2011 when asked about Greece’s financial crisis. Greece was on the ropes and the entire system about to collapse, so, of course they lied. Then they lied about lying. This raises a very reliable rule of thumb to keep in mind during (and before) a banking crisis: don’t trust anyone in the establishment, especially a politician. It’s good advice these days.
• The U.S. Government Is Targeting Your Retirement Savings… Here’s What You Can Do
  Even before the Obama Administration introduced the new myRA program last year, there were whispers that the U.S. government would “assume some risk” for U.S. retirement accounts. That makes for a nice sound bite, but it’s really code for forcing American savers to buy government bonds. Here’s how it works. There’s no minimum balance to open a myRA account. And the accounts don’t incur fees. However, your myRA can only invest in U.S. Treasuries, which probably won’t even come close to keeping up with the real rate of inflation. In other words, what myRAs really offer is “return-free risk.”
• Are You Planning Your Retirement? Forget About It. You Won’t Survive To Experience It.
  The Israeli agents who comprise the Neoconservatives, a collection of war criminals that control US foreign policy, have already handed you your death certificate. The neoconservatives have far more power than they have intelligence or humanity. At the recent St. Petersburg International Economic Conference, President Putin excoriated Western Journalists for endlessly repeating Washington’s lies that are driving the world to nuclear war. He asked Washington’s bought-and-paid-for-whores, the scum who comprise the Western news media: “How do you not understand that the world is being pulled in an irreversible direction toward nuclear war?” Yes, indeed, how is it possible for the Western media to be totally blind? The answer to this question is that Americans live in the system of lies that comprise The Matrix, and media are paid to support the system of lies. The determining questions are: Can Americans escape their captivity in time to save life on earth? Do Americans have what it takes, or are Americans already a proven failed people who cower in ignorance under the threat of implausible “foreign threats”?
• A Drone Was Used to Blow up a US Citizen Without Trial Yesterday. Let That Sink In
  The Dallas shootings have ushered in a very new world for U.S. citizens. For the very first time, a drone has been used on U.S. soil to kill an American without trial or charges.
  The suspected shooter in yesterday’s tragic killings, U.S. Army veteran Micah Xavier Johnson, was, according to police and press reports, holed up in a parking garage and would not give himself up. After hours of what police claimed were fruitless negotiations with Johnson, a weaponized robot was sent to where he was hiding and blown up, taking Johnson with it.
• Massive Stockpile Means Oil Rebound Is Over
  A massive global stockpile of oil could mean trouble ahead for the global crude market, according to Barclays. Crude oil prices dropped to a two month low on Thursday, after the Energy Information Administration reported a smaller-than-expected decrease in oil stockpiles. That may be a canary in the coalmine, a top energy market watcher explained. “For the last 6 quarters there’s been this discrepancy between global supply and global demand,” Michael Cohen, head of energy commodities research at Barclays, said last week on CNBC’s “Futures Now.”
• Japanese savers flood into gold fearing the endgame is close
  For all the talk about the surging yen as the biggest threat to Japan’s embattled economy, the truth is that there is another soaring currency (and asset) that is far more troubling for Shinzo Abe. Gold. While in past decades, the natural instinct of Japanese savers when faced with financial uncertainty has been to rush into the “safety” of cash (after all why allocate funds to government bonds that yield almost, or less, than nothing) as we recently showed in Safes Sell Out In Japan and Demand For Big Bills Soars As Japan Stuffs Safes With 10,000-Yen Notes, now something has changed. That something is increasing loss of faith in Japan’s currency.
• Keep an Eye on the Dollar: It’s More Important than Ever. Global demand is the main concern right now
  I have, on many occasions in the past in these pages, touched on the relationship between oil and the U.S. Dollar. The basics of that relationship are obvious: oil is priced in dollars on the global market, so from a logical perspective a strong dollar must put pressure on oil prices and vice versa. If the currency is worth more generally then anything priced in it is, relatively speaking, worth less…the price of that commodity goes down. This is not a tick for tick relationship, but over time and when broader trends emerge it generally holds true. That is reason enough for those who trade and invest in the energy sector to keep an eye on the dollar, but right now it may be even more important than ever.
• 2 Signs the government is planning to confiscate your retirement funds
  We’ve warned that bankrupt governments will be eyeing the multi-trillions of dollars in “un-taxed” retirement funds when they get desperate enough. Total funds currently held in private IRA and 401K accounts in the US are estimated to be in the neighborhood of $10 trillion. As we dance on the brink of a massive collapse, the government’s already empty coffers will be even further decimated as the economy contracts massively and tax receipts plummet. In that moment, rather than reducing expenditures and doing massive layoffs and closures of departments, like any regular business would do, politicians will nationalize retirement funds for the “good of the country”.
• Black Hole of Negative Rates Is Dragging Down Yields Everywhere
  The free fall in yields on developed-world government debt is dragging down rates on global bonds broadly, from sovereign debt in Taiwan and Lithuania to corporate bonds in the U.S., as investors fan out further in search of income. The ever-widening rush for yield could create problems if interest rates snap back, which would cause losses on investors’ low-yielding portfolios, or if credit quality falls. And the global yield grab is raising questions about whether rates can prove reliable economic indicators. Yields in the U.S., Europe and Japan have been plummeting as investors pile into government debt in the face of tepid growth, low inflation and high uncertainty, and as central banks cut rates into negative territory in many countries.
• Repeat Of 70s Pattern Shows That A $675 Silver Price Is Realistic
  In my previous silver article, I highlighted a very bullish pattern/fractal on the 100-year silver chart. It was a very big picture view of silver, which is really difficult to perceive within our current reality. However, at some point in time, it will catch up with our current reality. This will likely happen when the monetary system collapses. Silver, even more than gold, is the opposite of what is considered a monetary asset (debt, like a federal reserve note), today. This is mainly because silver has been completely demonetized, whereas gold is still a part of the current system (think central banks gold reserves). When the illusion of money (value) is exposed for what it is (worthless paper or digits), then people will demand real money (value) like silver and gold.
• Everything we love to eat is a scam
  Among the many things New Yorkers pride ourselves on is food: making it, selling it and consuming only the best, from single-slice pizza to four-star sushi. We have fish markets, Shake Shacks and, as of this year, 74 Michelin-starred restaurants. Yet most everything we eat is fraudulent. In his new book, “Real Food Fake Food,” author Larry Olmsted exposes the breadth of counterfeit foods we’re unknowingly eating. After reading it, you’ll want to be fed intravenously for the rest of your life.
• George Soros predicts riots, police state and civil war for America
  Billionaire investor George Soros has a new prediction for America. While it might be as dire as it gets for the financial wiz, this bet concerns more than just the value of the buck. According to Soros, there’s about to be an all-out class war. Soros, who is 81, previously bet against the British pound in the early 90s and made $1 billion off its collapse. In the years since, he’s remained active in investing, but also in advocacy. He’s helped keep Wikipedia afloat thanks to impressive contributions and through donations to the Tides Center, has indirectly funded Adbusters, the Canadian anti-capitalist magazine that put Occupy Wall Street on the map. Speaking to Newsweek recently, Soros neglected to acknowledge his past successes, but instead offered a word of warning: a period of “evil” is coming to the western world.
• How to destroy America in eight easy steps
  Just over eleven years ago, in June of 2005, an immigration overpopulation conference in Washington, DC, was held to review issues of immigration. It was filled to capacity by many of America ‘s finest minds and leaders.  Dick Lamm as the former Governor of Colorado (D) gave an eye-opening speech. A brilliant college professor by the name of Victor Davis Hanson  talked about his latest book, ‘Mexifornia,' explaining how immigration – both legal and illegal was destroying the entire state of California. He said it would march across the country until it destroyed all vestiges of The American Dream.  Moments later, former Colorado Governor Richard D. Lamm stood up and gave a stunning speech on how to destroy America. The audience sat spellbound as he described eight methods for the destruction of the United States.
• WTF Chart Of The Day – Factory Orders Collapse To Longest Streak In US History 
  For the 19th month in a row, US Factory Orders decline YoY (-1.2% for May) with a 1% drop MoM. Simply put, in 60 years of historical data, the US economy has never, ever suffered a 19 month stretch of consecutive annual declines. And yet we are supposed to believe there is no recession?
• AG Lynch Announces Global Police Force Partnership With UN
  During her speech at the United Nations, Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced that the Department of Justice is launching a global police force in order to combat “violent extremism” in the United States. A proposal such as this, with all of its various implications of an overreach of power, should be front-page news everywhere, but unfortunately, not many noticed. And that’s a concern to constitutional attorney KrisAnne Hall who released a video to make the rallying call.
• G20 trade ministers discuss protectionism, global recovery in Shanghai
  Chinese Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng has welcomed the adoption of the G20 trade growth strategy on Sunday. Trade Ministers from the group of 20 nations wrapped up a two-day meeting in Shanghai on Sunday. “This meeting was held in a positive atmosphere, expected results were achieved, and it was a complete success. The meeting became a good training ground at the trade and economic front for the G20 summit which will be held in September this year,” Gao told reporters.
• Alan “Bubbles” Greenspan Returns to Gold. After a misbegotten credit bubble and $60 trillion more of debt.
  Under a gold standard, the amount of credit that an economy can support is determined by the economy’s tangible assets, since every credit instrument is ultimately a claim on some tangible asset. […] The abandonment of the gold standard made it possible for the welfare statists to use the banking system as a means to an unlimited expansion of credit — Alan Greenspan, 1966. That old rascal! Before joining the feds, former Fed chief Alan “Bubbles” Greenspan was a strong proponent of gold and the gold standard. He wrote clearly and forcefully about how it was necessary to restrain the Deep State and protect individual freedom. Then he went to Washington and faced a fork in the tongue. In one direction, lay honesty and integrity. In the other, lay power and glory.
• DANGER: The World Is Now On The Verge Of The Largest Destruction Of Wealth In History
  With the price of gold and silver surging once again, today the man who has become legendary for his predictions on QE, historic moves in currencies, and major global events, warned King World News that we are now on the verge of the largest destruction of wealth the world has ever seen. Egon von Greyerz:  “Investors worldwide have never faced risk of the magnitude that the world is now exposed to. But sadly, very few are aware of this unprecedented risk. For the ones who understand risk and take the right decisions, it will “lead to fortune.” Only very few will choose that route. Instead, most investors will continue to live in the hope that current trends will go on forever, but sadly these people will end up “in shallows and in miseries.”…
• May trade deficit jumps 10% as U.S. consumers snap up more imports
  Stronger demand for imports such as cell phones, sneakers and home furnishings boost the U.S. trade deficit by 10% in May, but the rebound in consumer demand suggests the economy regained momentum after a slow start to the year. The nation’s trade gap climbed $41.1 billion — a three-month high — from a revised $37.4 billion in April, the government said Wednesday. Economists polled by MarketWatch had expected the trade gap of $40.2 billion.
• War On The Streets Of America: Protesters Attack Police Officers In Major Cities All Over The Nation
  This is what a nation looks like when it starts melting down from within.  A series of very disturbing incidents of police brutality against young black males has caused a firestorm to erupt all across the country.  You would have thought that the massacre of police in Dallas would have caused everyone to step back and reflect on what is really causing this cycle of violence, but instead the nationwide protests have gotten even bigger and more intense.  Over the weekend, protesters attacked police with rocks, bricks, bottles, fireworks, chunks of concrete, Molotov cocktails and rebar from a construction site.  In return, police fired pepper spray, smoke bombs and tear gas at protesters.  As I write this, more than 200 protesters have been arrested over the weekend so far, and authorities are bracing for what the coming night will bring.
• Debt Is Dragging Down American Consumers
  In May, we reported on the rising level of credit card debt in the US after the Wall Street Journal reported that credit card balances are on track to hit $1 trillion this year. Now we have evidence it might be even bleaker. A study released in June by CardHub reveals US consumers did worse than expected in the first quarter of 2016. And the study confirms that at this pace, by year-end, Americans will have accumulated more than $1 trillion in credit card debt. According to the study, Americans paid off $26.8 billion in credit card charges through the first quarter. That represents just 38% of the $71 billion in debt added during 2015. It was the smallest Q1 debt reduction since 2008, falling almost 25% below the post-recession average.
• The Dallas Massacre: This Is The Kind Of Civil Unrest That I Have Been Warning Is Coming To America
  Today is a day to mourn and pray for America. In Dallas, Texas last night, a hate-filled gunman ruthlessly started gunning down police officers. A total of 12 officers were shot, and five of them are now dead. If we do not learn to love one another, there is no hope for us as a nation. Unfortunately, the love of most people has grown cold, and today messages of hate and division from people on all sides of the debate are being posted all over social media. The massacre in Dallas represented the deadliest day for law enforcement officers in the United States since 9/11, and this is the kind of civil unrest that I have been repeatedly warning is coming to America. I have warned about this in my books, on radio and on television. But of course I am best known for my articles, and the following are just a handful where I warned about what we would soon see…
• The EU is breaking up politically and financially
  When David Cameron decided to let the British people vote on Brexit, he did not realise that he would open a real can of worms. Before the referendum I declared that Brexit would not be the reason for a collapse of the world economy but that it could be the catalyst for such a collapse. We have only seen a few days’ reaction with heavy intervention from central banks around the world but judging by the massive volatility we have seen so far, there is now a very high likelihood that a major secular decline in the world economy will now start to unravel. The next few weeks and months are likely to be a lot worse than the 2007-9 crisis.
• Separate Laws for Political Nobility & Economic Elite-Gerald Celente
  Trends researcher Gerald Celente says Hillary Clinton not being charged by the FBI for having a private unprotected email server is just a small part of an ongoing major trend. Celente explains, “It’s bigger than Clinton.  It’s a trend, and anybody can see it if they open their minds and add up the facts.  What we have now is a neo-feudal society.  It’s all connected.  It’s, as we call it, ‘global-nomic.’  Since Obama became President, and these are the facts, 95% of the wealth since 2009 has gone to the 1%.  Now, let’s take a trip around the world.  62 people have more dough than half of the world’s population combined.  In the United States, 400 people are worth $2.5 trillion.  What I am saying is the word ‘justice’ is being misspelled.  It’s J U S T U S—Just Us. . . . You have separate laws for the political nobility and the economic elite.”
• Americans And Canadians Face Silver Shortages As The Investment Deficit Surges
  Americans and Canadians will likely face silver shortages in the future as investment demand continues to surge higher.  This will come at time as the silver price skyrockets, thus making it even harder for investors to acquire physical metal. The U.S. and Royal Canadian Mints produce most of the Official Silver coins in the world.  In 2015, the combined total of Silver Eagles and Maples sales equaled 81.3 million ounces (Moz).
• The Bears Are Back – Oil Slides On Negative Sentiment
  After oil prices rallied more than 80 percent between February and June, WTI and Brent have fallen back more recently, dropping from above $50 to just $45 per barrel. Oil traders are searching for more clarity on what to expect next, but the cacophony of data pointing in different directions is leading to confusion for analysts and speculators. On the bullish side for oil prices is Citigroup, which published a research note on Monday saying that it is “especially bullish” on commodities in 2017. Citi says that the oil markets continue to balance, and the concerns over global economic growth are not as important as the demand trajectory. Moreover, the crash in oil prices has forced the industry to make cuts that will only sow the seeds of the next boom. “The oil market is treading water for now, but the oil price overshot to the downside earlier this year and this is clearly setting the stage for a bullish end to the decade,” Citi analysts, led by Ed Morse, said.
• Jubilee Jolt: Pre-Planned and Leaked ‘Summer of Chaos' Begins in Dallas
  It was only two days ago that we focused on the Black Lives Matter (BLM) leaked documents showing they were planning, in concert with the Obama Regime, a “Summer of Chaos.” Two days later, on 7/7 (the magic number 7!), the opening shots were fired in Dallas, Texas. Just as we predicted. During an evening rally of Black Lives Matter to protest two deadly police shootings, a sniper or snipers took aim from rooftops and killed or wounded numerous government law enforcers. Following all the trappings of past false flag attacks, the supposed sniper was killed… blown up in fact… before we could gain any information from him. But, as we said earlier, two top Black Lives Matter activists had their email and Twitter accounts hacked last month and it showed their plans, in concert with US Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, to cause massive riots and unrest in what they termed the “Summer of Chaos.”
• Global Investment to Plunge, Trade to Languish, on “Depressed” Demand: G-20 Trade Ministers
  Facing “depressed market demand” and plunging global cross-border investment, the trade ministers of the G-20 countries along with folks from the IMF, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the World Trade Organization, among others, met in Shanghai this weekend to hash out a plan. As at all these meetings, they reached an agreement, of sorts. The G-20 countries account for about 85% of global trade and 70% of global investment, so they matter.
• The Anatomy of a False Flag Event
  This are article examines three critical aspects of a false flag event and then applies what is known, and typical of a false flag event to the murder of five Dallas police officers earlier in the week. By the way, the above picture strongly suggests that there is a lot more to the official narrative than the public is being told. The three areas of concern are: Rehearsal of certain aspects of the event by either First Responser, LEO, or both. If the false flag event consists of an assassination(s), the narrative includes acting alone, the “discovery” of a diary or a mainfesto which states the murderous intentions of the “patsy”, and the labeling of the so-called perpetrator as being insane so the act can be referred to as a random act of insane violence so the subject of a conspiracy never enters the discussion by the media and the authorities investigating the crime. Disguise the purpose of the event.
• Fear, Loathing & Record Money-Making in Government Bonds
  US Treasuries set new records on Friday: The 10-year note rose to a new high, with the yield dropping to a new low of 1.366%. The 30-year Treasury bond also hit a new high, with the yield dropping to 2.11%, a record low. If 2.11% sounds like a miserably low return for tying up your money for three decades of hell and high water, it’s practically bond nirvana for whatever else is out there.
• Andy Hoffman: The End Game has Arrived – Protect Yourself, and Do It Now!
  Andy is short for words. This is the latest produced through SilverFarm, the best source for podcast and on-the-go info you seek. Give Andy a good listen as he provides us with his take on unfolding economic collapse. As most of you know our economy is in serious trouble. We should all take time each day to focus on our personal economy and think of improvements that could be made. Small changes in ones personal economic habits make a huge difference at the end of the day, week, month and year.
• Bernanke’s Black Helicopters
  Ben Bernanke is one of the most dangerous men walking the planet. In this age of central bank domination of economic life he is surely the pied piper of monetary ruin. At least since 2002 he has been talking about “helicopter money” as if a notion which is pure economic quackery actually had some legitimate basis. But strip away the pseudo scientific jargon, and it amounts to monetization of the public debt—–the very oldest form of something for nothing economics. Back then, of course, Ben’s jabbering about helicopter money was taken to be some sort of theoretical metaphor about the ultimate powers of central bankers, and especially their ability to forestall the boogey-man of “deflation”.
• Is The BIS Setting Up The World For Another Meltdown?
  On the heels of another wild trading week, is the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) setting up the world for another meltdown? Stephen Leeb:  “In 2013, the Bank of International Settlements (BIS), one of the most powerful institutions you may never have heard of – blew it. It snubbed gold. I’ll explain how in a moment – contributing to gold sinking from $1,800 an ounce in October 2012 to below $1,200 by the end of June 2013, a massive 35 percent plunge in a mere eight months. The downtrend continued until the end of last year when gold briefly traded below $1,050…
• The ECB’s Bank Stress Test Shows Fatal Errors
  The United States have learned from their bad experiences during the Global Financial Crisis wherein almost its entire financial system was going down in flames. Stress tests to find out how banks would be able to deal with economic adverse scenarios became mandatory, and the European Union followed suit with its stress tests in 2011, followed by a series of check-ups later on. Almost a decade has passed since the GFC, and half a decade since the European stress tests, but the volatility and unrest in the financial world has never been this high. You would think that five years of ECB-supported lending would have helped these banks (as even though the net interest spreads did decrease, the access to the ultra-cheap lending facilities of the ECB allowed the banks to continue to generate positive results), nothing has changed, and more than 5 years after the term ‘PIIGS’ became one of the most well-known words to describe the economic mess in the weaker European, one of the I’s is now once again in serious economic trouble.
• Deutsche Bank's Chief Economist Calls For €150 Billion Bailout Of European Banks
  The cards have been tipped, and it appears Italy's Prime Minister may have been right. In the aftermath of Brexit, much of the investing public's attention has turned to Italian banks which are in desperate need of a bailout as a result of €360 billion in bad loans growing worse by the day (and not a bail-in, as European regulations mandate, as that would lead to an immediate bank run) to avoid a freeze and/or collapse of Italy's banking sector. This has pushed stock prices – and default risk – on Italian banks to record levels. So far Italy's bailout requests have mostly fallen on deaf ears, as Germany's political leaders have resisted Renzi's recurring pleas for a taxpayer funded rescue. However, as we have alleged, and as the Italian Prime Minister admitted last week, the core risk for Europe is not just the Italian banking sector but the biggest bank of all in Europe: Deutsche Bank.
• Charting The Epic Collapse Of The World’s Most Systemically Dangerous Bank
  Now the REAL question: what happens to Deutsche Bank’s derivative book, which has a notional value of €52 trillion, if the bank is insolvent? It’s been almost 10 years in the making, but the fate of one of Europe’s most important financial institutions appears to be sealed. After a hard-hitting sequence of scandals, poor decisions, and unfortunate events,Visual Capitalist’s Jeff Desjardins notes that Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank shares are now down -48% on the year to $12.60, which is a record-setting low. Even more stunning is the long-term view of the German institution’s downward spiral. With a modest $15.8 billion in market capitalization, shares of the 147-year-old company now trade for a paltry 8% of its peak price in May 2007.
• DEAD PULSE: The Morgue is the Next Stop For the Financial System – Jim Willie
  The Gold price will find its true value and price over $10,000 per ounce. The Silver price will find its true value and price over $300 per ounce. In reaching these levels, the ratio will return to the 30-1 range. The ruling bankers realize no remedy is possible. They are just trying to steal as many assets and accumulate as much gold as possible before the main bust event.
• They Know It’s Coming: Insurance Company Risk Experts Have Started Hoarding Physical Gold and Cash Ahead Of Crisis
  How do you know when the world’s economic, financial and monetary systems are in trouble? Answer: When re-insurance companies, whose sole purpose is to insure other insurance companies, start to panic into gold and begin hoarding cash it’s probably a reliable signal that things aren’t going as well as our central bankers’ best laid plans imply. That’s exactly what’s happening right now: A real paradigm shift is taking place in the markets…  Even one of the world’s second largest re-insurers is now buying physical gold… They’re even adding physical cash… This is the insurance industry’s insurance company… They are the risk experts and they now are buying physical gold bullion and storing physical cash… The importance of this move is possibly the most significant flow of capital that you will see in your lifetime…
• The Great Market Tide Has Now Shifted
  In the conventional investment perspective, risk-on assets (i.e. investments with higher risks and higher potential returns) such as stocks are on a see-saw with risk-off assets (investments with lower returns and lower risk, such as Treasury bonds). When risk appetites are high, institutional managers and speculators move money into stocks and high-yield junk bonds, and move money out of safe-haven assets such as gold and U.S. Treasuries. But recently, markets are no longer following this convention. Safe haven assets such as precious metals and Treasuries are soaring at the same time that stock markets bounced strongly off the post-Brexit lows. Risk-on assets (stocks) rising at the same time as safe-haven assets is akin to dogs marrying cats and living happily ever after.
• IMF says EU on brink of collapse and ‘untenable' Euro may have to be SCRAPPED 
  THE FUTURE of euro currency and the entire EU project looks unsustainable without major change, according to a damning review by the International Monetary Fund and renowned economists. IMF chiefs warned the UK’s decision to leave the EU would seriously hamper growth prospects in the region. Before the Brexit vote, the IMF forecast a 1.7 per cent expansion for the eurozone. However, post Brexit the organisation revised that down to 1.6 per cent this year and 1.4 per cent next year.
• Markets are showing one of the same signs they did in 2007
  We may still be in a bull market, but it really doesn't feel like one. And at least one indicator suggests we could be heading for a slide. Since the beginning of this year, the S&P 500 (.SPX) is being driven by sectors traditionally considered to be safe investments, such as utilities (.5SP5510), telecom (.5SP5010) and consumer staples (.5SP30). The stock index is hovering less than a percent off its own 52-week high as of Friday morning. Generally, when the broader market is lifted by these “defensive” sectors, it means investors are looking for safe havens where they can weather a future storm. That could be a precursor to an economic slowdown. In fact, one of the last times we saw defensive sectors outperform riskier ones was in 2007, just before the onset of the financial crisis.
• Financial Analyst Warns: “Millions Will Die” When Financial System Collapses
  Trillions of dollars of currency are being moved or rushing towards the debt market that is squeezing bond yields to historic lows. We are making history in the United States for the second week in a row, and I am talking about the bond market. Both gold and silver, since the beginning of this year, have taken off like rockets, and they are not going to stop. This environment is on the edge…
• U.S. Economy Improving: How When 70% of Americans Don’t Have $1,000?
  Truth be told, there isn’t any economic growth in the U.S. economy and that’s because the average American is struggling to the extreme. In fact, according to a poll done by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs, about 70% of Americans would have trouble coming up with $1,000 to cover an emergency! In the same survey, 46% of Americans said their wages have remained stagnant in the past five years, while 16% said their salaries have actually seen cuts.
• Rickards: $10,000 – $50,000 Gold!
  “People around the world are losing confidence in central bank money,” Jim Rickards said in a recent interview. “When you lose confidence in central bank money, you look for other forms of money and gold is the best.” Despite all of our talk about cryptocurrencies over the past couple of weeks, we must point out, one more time, that investing in the cryptosphere — even Bitcoin — is a gamble. Yes, they are exciting. And, yes, some of them will be immensely disruptive. But there are a number of things that, in our shaky global environment, works against them. If the lights go out, for example, your stash of Bitcoin, Siacoin and Synereo aren’t going to get you very far.
• How Gold Bears End——Eerie 1974-1976 Pattern Repetition Revisited
  Gold Continues to Mimic the 1970s. Ask and ye shall receive… we promised we would update the comparison chart we last showed in late November in an article that kind of insinuated that it might be a good time to buy gold and gold stocks (see: “Gold and Gold Stocks – It Gets Even More Interesting” for the details). We are hereby delivering on that promise. It is actually interesting to revisit both past articles speculating about a potential gold bottom that turned out to be correct (those would be the many articles we penned on the topic from August 2015 onward) as well as those that turned out to be incorrect (which would e.g. include a number of articles written in late 2014. Although they managed to catch a playable rally in timely fashion, it ultimately turned out to be a bear market rally).
• No Charges for Clinton Proves Two Tier Legal System, Global Crash is Certain, Buy Gold and Silver
  You’ve heard by now, Democratic presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton will not be charged over her unprotected email servers she used while at the State Department. Even though FBI Director James Comey pointed out multiple lies Ms. Clinton told, he decided not to recommend charges and said he “could not prove intent.”   He also explained his decision to Congress this week but would not comment when asked about other investigations into the Clinton Foundation.  Comey revealed that he did not personally interview Ms. Clinton last Saturday or even attend the deposition.  He also revealed that Clinton did not testify under oath.  Democrats in the hearing said Republicans were grilling Comey just to score points against their presidential candidate.  Now, leaders in the House of Representatives are preparing a recommendation to the FBI to look into allegations Clinton lied to Congress in the Benghazi hearings.
• Gerald Celente – The Last Great Opportunity To Buy Gold & Silver
  Today top trends forecaster Gerald Celente spoke with King World News about the action in gold and silver and what KWN readers around the world should expect next. Gerald Celente:  “$10.7 trillion of negative yields — that is what is driving the gold market, along with the turmoil in the currency markets. The British pound just plunged over 20 percent in a matter of days. So these are the catalysts for the bid in the gold market…
• This is what gold's top tipster is saying about prices
  Gold’s top forecaster, who in February abandoned her bearish outlook to correctly call bullion’s surge, sees more gains in store before prices taper off by year-end. The metal will climb to $1,425 an ounce by the end of September, 4.4% higher than now, before dipping in the following six months amid prospects for higher U.S. interest rates, said  Georgette Boele, a currency and commodity analyst at ABN Amro Bank NV. The 43-year old was rated by Bloomberg as the most accurate forecaster. Boele has been right on the way up and also the way down. At the start of 2013, she was among the most bearish analysts before gold capped its first annual drop in 13 years. She called for lower prices until just a few months after bullion touched a five-year low in December. With Brexit-related concerns over the global economy’s strength and U.S. interest rates not expected to rise anytime soon, gold’s now near a two-year high.
• Gold & Silver To Be Last Currencies Standing – Peter Boockvar
  The pervasive bullish sentiment towards gold continues as prices maintain solid gains and has one Wall Streeter saying the secular bull market is back in full force. “After rallying for 12 straight years and peaking in September 2011 at around $1,900 per troy ounce, gold fell into a very lengthy bear market that I believe ended in December 2015 at $1,050,” said Peter Boockvar, the chief market analyst for the Lindsey Group, in a CNBC post Thursday.
• Privately Minted Silver Coins Were Legitimate Money in the 1800s
  In the early 1830s, an eastern Kentucky man named Josiah Sprinkle started minting his own coins and circulating them around the area. Eventually, government officials got wind of Sprinkle’s operation and arrested him. But he was ultimately found not-guilty in court. How did a man minting his own coins escape the long arm of the law? Because his coins were pure silver. They were equal in value to the silver dollars minted by the US government. In fact, they were worth slightly more.
• U.S. GMO food labeling bill passes Senate
  The U.S. Senate on Thursday approved legislation that would for the first time require food to carry labels listing genetically-modified ingredients, which labeling supporters say could create loopholes for some U.S. crops. The Senate voted 63-30 for the bill that would display GMO contents with words, pictures or a bar code that can be scanned with smartphones. The U.S. Agriculture Department (USDA) would decide which ingredients would be considered genetically modified. The measure now goes to the House of Representatives, where it is expected to pass.
• Signs the Government is Planning to Confiscate Your Retirement Funds
  We’ve warned that bankrupt governments will be eyeing the multi-trillions of dollars in “un-taxed” retirement funds when they get desperate enough. It is an incredibly common occurrence.  It has happened in numerous countries in just recent memory.  Poland, Hungary and Bolivia are a few in the last years where retirement funds have been seized. Total funds currently held in private IRA and 401K accounts in the US are estimated to be in the neighborhood of $10 trillion.  That number looks awfully enticing to the US government which is currently indebted to the tune of $19 trillion and holding liabilities of over $100 trillion. As we dance on the brink of a massive collapse, the government’s already empty coffers will be even further decimated as the economy contracts massively and tax receipts plummet.
• Fear factor behind property fund withdrawals, say experts
  The fear factor is causing investors to withdraw money from commercial property funds, according to one of the City's senior fund managers. Philip Nell, a fund director at Hermes, said there had been “a massive over-reaction to what's been going on over the last two weeks”. Mr Nell used to run the Aviva property fund that closed its doors along with five other funds this week. Henderson, Canada Life and Threadneedle became the latest on Wednesday.
• IMF Sees Pakistan’s Currency Overvalued as Loan Program Near End
  Pakistan’s currency is overvalued by as much as 20 percent and is contributing to the country’s declining exports, along with low commodity prices, power outages and security concerns, according to the International Monetary Fund. A December study from the Washington-based lender found the exchange rate was “broadly” overvalued by 5 percent to 20 percent, Harald Finger, the IMF’s mission chief for Pakistan, said in a Tuesday phone interview from Washington. “More or less that’s still our assessment.” The rupee and Pakistan’s stocks have been among Asia’s best performers since 2013, when Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif — who’s in London recovering from open-heart surgery — took a $6.6 billion loan from the IMF to avert a balance-of-payments crisis. Finance Minister Ishaq Dar reiterated last month that Pakistan doesn’t need another IMF program with the current one due to finish at the end of September.
• Populist Politicians Take On Italy’s Massive Debt Pile
  The Rome Olympics of 1960 marked the rebound of the Italian capital after years of war and reconstruction, an affirmation of the country’s renaissance and the city’s emergence as a symbol of dolce vita insouciance. Rome is still paying the bill, and the new mayor, Virginia Raggi, is sick of it. The city has roughly €13.6 billion ($15.2 billion) in debt and more than 12,000 creditors—though the pile is so complex no one really knows how much is owed to whom. Rome faces outstanding bills for operating its 61-year-old metro system, hauling trash, and running a network of unprofitable pharmacies that compete with private shops. The courts are grappling with hundreds of lawsuits over unpaid debts going back 50 years for land expropriated to build hospitals, streets, and other city projects—including some debts connected to the 1960 games, former Mayor Ignazio Marino has said. The average interest rate: 5 percent, at a time when the Italian government is issuing 10-year bonds at 1.5 percent annually. “We can’t keep paying such high interest just because nobody bothered to renegotiate the debt,” Raggi, who was elected on June 19, told the RAI television network.
• Gross Calls Sovereign Bonds Too Risky With U.S. Yields Near Lows
  Bill Gross said sovereign bond yields at record lows aren’t worth the risk. “The sovereign bonds are not up my alley,” Gross, who built the world’s biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co. and is now at Denver-based Janus Capital Group Inc., said on Bloomberg Television Wednesday. “It’s too risky.” Low yields mean bonds are especially vulnerable because a small increase can bring a large decline in price, he said. Yields in the U.S., the U.K. and Australia pushed to all-time lows Wednesday, while those in Germany and Japan dropped to unprecedented levels below zero. The average yield on the bonds in Bank of America Corp.’s World Sovereign Bond Index this week dropped below 1 percent for the first time, based on data going back to 2006, while almost $10 trillion of securities in the Bloomberg Global Developed Sovereign Bond Index yield less than zero.
• What a difference in two weeks! Project Fear mastermind Osborne joins US banking giants to insist City will continue to THRIVE following historic Brexit vote
  George Osborne and the Wall Street banking giants which helped bankroll the Remain campaign yesterday issued a resounding vote of confidence in the City of London. In a joint statement with the Chancellor, investment banks including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan pledged to ensure the City of London remains the world’s dominant financial centre when it leaves the EU. The firms said that while Brexit ‘clearly presents economic challenges’, they would strive to ensure Britain ‘remains one of the most attractive places in the world to do business’.
• Britain readies for showdown with Putin as it stations troops throughout Eastern Europe
  HUNDREDS of British troops are set to be scrambled to countries bordering Russia as a show of strength to Vladimir Putin. David Cameron will announce the deployment of a 500-strong battalion to Estonia with a further company of 150 troops to be stationed in Poland “on an enduring basis”. The move comes amid continuing concerns from the Western alliance regarding the intentions of Vladimir Putin following Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014.
• Property funds worth £18bn suspend trading in biggest seize-up since financial crisis
  Property funds worth £18 billion have stopped trading after Brexit sent a chill through the commercial property market. The number of funds that have suspended trading has risen to seven since Standard Life stopped investors from taking out funds worth £2.9 billion on Monday, ten days after the Brexit vote. The fear was that too many property investors would try to take their money out at once, forcing fund managers to sell properties at a loss. More than half the funds in commercial property funds are on lockdown. The cooling of the construction industry has fuelled concerns that property prices and rental values could start to fall, leading investors to believe their that their money might be safer elsewhere.
• Business minister Sajid Javid opens preliminary trade talks with India
  The business minister is to launch trade talks with India, marking the start of a world tour aimed at drawing up a blueprint for Britain’s role in the global economy outside the European Union. Sajid Javid will hold preliminary talks with Indian government ministers in Delhi on Friday, marking the start of what is expected to be years of negotiations to establish new trade deals with individual countries. These bilateral deals will replace agreements the EU has with more than 50 countries.
• Must Listen: It's Over: Bill Holter
  On this edition of X22Report Spotlight, posted on Saturday, July 9th, 2016, returning guest Bill Holter of Jim Sinclair's Mineset discussed how the insolvency of the major European banks such as Deutsche Bank currently make them the leading candidates for a domino effect of collapse that will leave no bank in the world untouched. Bill briefly touched on Ben Bernanke's meeting next week in Japan with Kuroda and Abe, and how the likely topic of their discussion is helicopter money. He also pointed out that central bankers need a fall guy for their failed policies, and in this case, they will probably blame the global collapse on Brexit, with the war card also being played as a sufficient distraction.
• Secret memos expose link between oil firms and invasion of Iraq
  Plans to exploit Iraq's oil reserves were discussed by government ministers and the world's largest oil companies the year before Britain took a leading role in invading Iraq, government documents show. The papers, revealed here for the first time, raise new questions over Britain's involvement in the war, which had divided Tony Blair's cabinet and was voted through only after his claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The minutes of a series of meetings between ministers and senior oil executives are at odds with the public denials of self-interest from oil companies and Western governments at the time.
• Domestic Trade Is Disintegrating: Heavy Truck Orders Plunge To Lowest Since 2010
  Who says you need trade and logistics to maintain the S&P within 2% of its all time high? Not the Fed, that's who, and it's a wonderful thing because the state of US heavy trucking – the backbone of domestic trade infrastructure and logistical supply chains – suggests the US economy is in a far more dire state than the Fed would ever admit. According to the latest data from ACT Research released today, June orders for new heavy-duty, or Class 8, trucks plunged to just 13,100, the lowest number since 2010 according to the WSJ (and since 2012 according to Bloomberg, but no need to split hairs here) indicating that trucking companies – the forward-looking bedrock of any viable recovery along with rails – expect little relief from a weak freight market and sluggish economic growth. This month’s order activity was the lowest monthly total since July 2012 and the worst June since 2009.
• Our Future Is (Literally) Crumbling Before Our Eyes
  The sorts of predicaments the world faces — ranging from over $200 trillion in debt, to our unsustainable addiction to fossil fuels, to our over-stressed ecosystems — all require that we get deadly serious about confronting them ASAP, and make difficult decisions and trade-offs. However, our global leaders always seem to opt to kick the can down the road if at all possible. Short-term thinking and near-term priorities dependably get precedence over doing the right thing for the future. Tomorrow’s generations are thrown under the bus by selfishly motivated actors today. As I’ve put forth over and over again: we’re simply not going to make it unless we get much more serious about our efforts than we have been to date. Yes, it’s a wonderful thing that Elon Musk is building sexy electric cars; but even a single minute spent with a pencil, paper and the aggregate energy statistics on transportation will reveal that there’s an enormous gap between where we currently are and where we need to be.
• A Furious Italian Prime Minister Slams Deutsche Bank As Europe's Most Insolvent Bank
  Several years ago, we were the first to point out the true “elephant in the room”, namely Deutsche Bank's $75 trillion in derivatives which as we said at the time was about 20 times bigger than Germany's GDP, and 5 times bigger than the entire economic output of the Eurozone.” This was largely ignored by the “experts” because why bring attention to something which is fundamentally a devastating break in the narrative that “Europe is fine” and the financial crisis is now contained. Fast forward to today when Europe is once again not fine, only this time one can't blame Europe's problems on Greece (instead the same “experts” are trying to blame everything in Brexit), when in a surprising admission of reality, none other than Italy's prime minister Matteo Renzi, “went there” and slammed Deutsche Bank as the true “derivative problem” facing Europe.
• Gerald Celente – A Devastating Crisis Is About To Be Unleashed On The World
  Today top trends forecaster Gerald Celente warned that a devastating crisis is about to be unleashed on the world. Gerald Celente:  From geopolitics to socioeconomics, from environmental to technology, be it the body politic or personal health, as trend forecasters it is essential to have a clear understanding of where we are and the knowledge of how we got here to see where we are going…
• So What’s Going on with Inflation in Argentina?
  When Argentine President Mauricio Macri took power, his economic team began to dismantle his predecessor’s heavy-handed policies — a process that had painful recessionary consequences for the Argentine population. Macri and his team repeatedly promised that by the second half of 2016, the pain would be worth it, the economy would recover and we would see some results. In a press conference yesterday, Macri announced that his policies have successfully put the country’s economy back on track.
• Investor Fears Spike as Italy (and the EU) Inch Closer to Doomsday Scenario
  Just how low can Italian bank shares go? That’s the question plaguing the minds of European investors, policy makers, bankers and central bankers. Today the shares of the country’s third largest publicly traded bank, Monte Dei Paschi, plunged 14% to €0.33, their lowest point ever. Two years ago, they ran between €5 and €9. The reason for the latest plunge was news that the ECB had sent the bank a letter urging it to draw up a plan for tackling its bad-loan burden. The lender is being asked to reduce its load of curdled debt by €10 billion to €14.6 billion by 2018. That’s a big ask even in the best of times, and these are certainly not the best of times for Monte Dei Paschi. According to Bloomberg, its loan loss provisions would represent over 95% of its operating profits.
• The Big Unravel: US Commercial Bankruptcies Skyrocket
  This year through June, there have been 91 corporate defaults globally, the highest first-half total since 2009, according to Standard and Poor’s. Of them, 60 occurred in the US. Some of them are going to end up in bankruptcy. Others are restructuring their debts outside of bankruptcy court by holding the bankruptcy gun to creditors’ heads. In the process, stockholders will often get wiped out. These are credit fiascos at larger corporations – those that pay Standard and Poor’s to rate their credit so that they can sell bonds in the credit markets. But in the vast universe of 19 million American businesses, there are only about 3,025 companies, or 0.02% of the total, with annual revenues over $1 billion; they’re big enough to pay Standard & Poor’s for a credit rating.
• Venezuela Refuses to Default. Few People Seem to Understand Why
  It’s been almost two years now since the renowned Harvard economist Ricardo Hausmann caused a stir in his native Venezuela by posing an uncomfortable question. Why does a country that’s so starved for cash keep honoring its foreign debts? In other words, how does it justify shelling out precious hard currency to wealthy bondholders in New York when it can’t pay for basic food and medicine imports desperately needed by millions of impoverished citizens? “I find the moral choice odd,” Hausmann concluded.
• There’s a $3 Trillion Pool of Money Set to Extend Treasury Surge
  Bank of America Corp. sees the $3 trillion U.S. corporate pension industry throwing its interest-rate assumptions out the window. And that means the retirement plans will probably throw more money into Treasuries. Even with yields at record lows, Shyam Rajan, head of U.S. rates strategy at the primary dealer, says pensions are likely to embrace the lower-for-longer mantra and bolster the $13.4 trillion Treasuries market. With only 6 percent of assets in Treasuries, half the peak seen in the 1980s, the retirement funds are primed to join buyers looking for a selloff to pounce. That demand waiting in the wings may depress yields further. Bank of America forecasts yields on 10-year notes will fall to 1.25 percent by the end of September, from about 1.39 percent as of 12:10 p.m. in New York on Wednesday.
• Obama's Medicare ‘reform' blocking seniors from accessing important services including knee replacements; hospitals rewarded for spending less per patient
  Remember when the liberal left accused us all of being paranoid racists for reading senior citizen death panels between the lines of Obamacare? It turns out that these hysterical Democrats were wrong once again, as new Medicare reforms issued by the Obama administration are reportedly stripping aging Americans of their coverage and leaving them to fend for themselves. According to the New York Post, Obama is completely “dismantling” Medicare, “dooming seniors to needless pain and disability and shortening their lives.” It might sound a bit hyperbolic, but it's true; the new rules apparently scrap Medicare coverage for things like hip and knee replacements, cataract operations and heart surgeries – you know, the things seniors need to actually keep on living.
• Central Banker Who Slayed ‘Zombie Banks’ Meets Too Big to Fail
  In two years as governor of Ukraine’s central bank, Valeriya Gontareva has shut down nearly half the country’s lenders, a financial purge with few modern precedents. But at a private dinner this spring with George Soros, she worried that it won’t be enough to banish permanently from Ukraine what she calls “oligarch banking.” “What concerns us both is the dominant position of one particular bank,” the billionaire investor recounted in a recent interview. It “has more than half the banking business and is in the hands of an oligarch who is very powerful.”
• U.K. Property Fund Suspensions Send a Warning to the Junk Bond World
  Investors in U.K. commercial real estate just touched a nerve. In pulling their money out of property funds at such a rapid pace four asset managers froze withdrawals this week, the investors showed how the cost of Brexit is spreading. They also tapped into one of the biggest fears of bond market observers: a mismatch between the liquidity of investment funds and their assets. The real estate funds are designed to allow investors to withdraw their money on a daily basis, while the properties backing them could take months to sell. That's similar to many mutual and exchange-traded funds that buy junk bonds — securities that can take weeks to sell — and offer daily redemptions. Yet while the property funds have grabbed the headlines and spooked markets, the bigger threat may be posed by bond funds.

Precious Metals Are The Only Lifeboat! I have persistently WARNED you what was happening in the gold market and why you needed to convert your paper assets to physical gold and silver by the middle of September 2015. You need to hedge against the financial instability with physical gold and silver. Call the experts to help you convert your IRA or 401k into Gold, Silver and Other Precious Metals. Call GoldCo NOW before it's too late! Call Toll-Free 1-877-414-1385.

From James Harkin (Webmaster & Editor of LindseyWilliams.net). Here is a summary of articles of interest from around the world for this week. Please LIKE the Lindsey Williams Online Facebook Page to see stories posted daily regarding the current state of the economy around the world.

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Latest News From July 1, 2016 to July 7, 2016:

• Collapse of Empires is Upon Us-Gregory Mannarino
  Trader and analyst Gregory Mannarino says what is going on today with the FBI refusing to indict Hillary Clinton is nothing new when considering the “fall of empires.” Mannarino explains, “This is a cycle, and we are seeing several pieces fall into place regarding the political system and the financial system that we have seen over and over again.  There is a lifespan of an empire . . . at the top of every empire . . . there is an issue of the financial system, and there is an issue with the political system that becomes absolutely corrupt.  This is why this announcement (FBI not indicting Clinton) came.  Again, this is political corruption.  It’s not just here in the United States, but globally it is flashing red across the sky. . . . I think they are well aware that the whole system is going down. The collapse of empires is upon us. . . . We are in an environment that globally we have never seen before.  With what we are seeing in the United States with the corruption in politics, we’ve seen that before.  Every great empire, right at the top, the two key elements that appear are financial system on the edge and political corruption trying to patch it all together.  That is something we see over and over again throughout history.”
• Market turmoil to persist: Follow the money, follow gold
  From geopolitics to socioeconomics, from environmental to technology, be it the body politic or personal health, as trend forecasters it is essential to have a clear understanding of where we are and the knowledge of how we got here to see where we are going. Global equity markets are in turmoil. However, the business media’s view of market mayhem is a snapshot in time dating to the June 23 “Brexit” when the United Kingdom voted to exit the European Union. Indeed, while Brexit triggered the current turmoil, our trends-eye view identifies the current market volatility in a Globalnomic® context far bigger than Brexit. For example, just one year ago, Chinese equity markets were in crash mode. The Shanghai Index, up 150 percent in a year, plummeted some 40 percent by mid-July 2015. In just one day, it had its second-biggest fall in its history. Following a summer that plunged Chinese markets into bear territory, global equity markets had their worst quarterly showing since 2011. It got worse.
• These six former Goldman Sachs bankers want to destroy your savings
  Rule #1 in central banking: Never go full Draghi. Mario Draghi, of course, is the President of the European Central Bank (ECB) who pledged to do “whatever it takes” to save the euro. Or was it save the world? We forget. Anyhow, Mark Carney, the head of the Bank of England, just went full Draghi, pledging to do, effectively, whatever it takes… even if that means destroy the British pound or economy. Future historians will no doubt look back at this period in amazement, wondering, given the stunning and murderous failures of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, how central planning ever managed to find a last hold-out amongst the world’s central banks. Yes, Britain may have finally escaped from the EU lunatic asylum.
• State pension scrapped for under 30s?
  One in five 18 to 30 year olds don’t believe there will be a state pension for them when they eventually retire. When asked about the new flat rate state pension , more than half admitted they hadn’t a clue how much it paid out, according to research from workplace pension provider NOW:Pensions. Once they knew the amount, currently £155.65 a week, two in five said that wasn’t enough to retire on. This come on the back of previous research from NOW:Pensions with 100 cross party MPs where almost one in six didn’t expect the state pension to be around 30 years time, or if there still is one it will be at a much lower level.
• Property market turmoil has eerie echoes of start of financial crisis
  The name “Bear Stearns” is enough to send a shudder down the spine of any investor who survived the financial crisis. The collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 is generally regarded as the moment when the entire financial system almost came crashing down. But it is often forgotten that the glue that held it together had started to come unstuck more than a year earlier. The first sign that things were unravelling was when American investment bank Bear Stearns prevented investors taking money out of two mortgage-related hedge funds in the summer of 2007. Eventually, both were liquidated.
• Globalists Are Now Openly Demanding New World Order Centralization
  I have said it many times in the past — when elitist criminals start openly admitting to their schemes it means that they are ready to pull the plug on the current system. They simply don’t care anymore who knows their plans because they think that victory is inevitable. There have been more subtle and less prominently published calls for a “new world order” in the past, to be sure.  However, at no other time have I seen international financiers and their puppet political mouthpieces so brazen about calling for global centralization than in the wake of the successful Brexit referendum. It is as if the Brexit flipped a switch in the existing narrative and set loose a flood of new propaganda, all aimed at convincing the general public that central banks must combine forces and act as one institution in order to combat an economic crisis that isn’t even visible to laymen yet.
• FBI's Hillary decision all part of jubilee plan towards greater chaos
  Many people in the US were shocked that Killary Clinton was not indicted by the FBI today. Those people clearly have no idea what is going on.  Since when has the government ever investigated itself (or its top figureheads and power players) and found itself guilty?  You just have to look at the complete sham of the “9/11 Commission Report” to know that. Hillary has been selected (there are no real Presidential elections in the US) as the next President.  Five of her close network attended Bilderberg this year where they have a record of selecting the next President. It matters not that she literally speaks in front of crowds that can be counted using your fingers while people like Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump speak in front of football stadiums. If people in the US don’t realize they are enslaved under a heinously criminal organization then the fluoride in the water, mainstream media programming and 12 years of government indoctrination camps have done their job. But, this goes far deeper than most realize.
• Here We Go Again – Stockman Warns Of August 2007 Redux
  Nearly everywhere on the planet the giant financial bubbles created by the central banks during the last two decades are fracturing. The latest examples are the crashing bank stocks in Italy and elsewhere in Europe and the sudden trading suspensions by four UK commercial property funds. If this is beginning to sound like August 2007 that’s because it is. And the denials from the casino operators are coming in just as thick and fast. Back then, the perma-bulls were out in full force peddling what can be called the “one-off” bromide. That is, evidence of a brewing storm was spun as just a few isolated mistakes that had no bearing on the broad market trends because the “goldilocks” economy was purportedly rock solid. Thus, the unexpected collapse of Countrywide Financial was blamed on the empire building excesses of the Orange Man (Angelo Mozillo)  and the collapse of the Bear Stearns mortgage funds was purportedly owing to a lapse in supervision.
• Economic crisis bares hunger problem in Venezuela
  Kelly Vega says she lost 30 pounds in three months as she focused on feeding her 6-year-old daughter rather than herself. “We are eating two meals a day. If we eat breakfast, there's no lunch. If we have lunch, there's no dinner,” she said. This socialist country is suffering from severe food shortages that are making it hard to get enough to eat, even though Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. Government officials blame the shortfalls on right-wing business owners hoarding products to sow chaos, while their detractors say it's the result of chronic economic mismanagement.
• The Thin Veneer Of Civilization That We All Take For Granted Is Evaporating All Over The Globe
  Have you noticed that the world seems to be going a little bit more crazy with each passing month?  Here we are halfway through 2016, and the rot and decay that are eating at the foundations of civilized society seem to be rapidly gaining momentum.  Every single day, all of us take certain things for granted as we go through our normal routines.  For example, as you walk down the street you probably take it for granted that someone is not going to pull out a gun and try to shoot you.  As members of a civilized society, we have come to expect that our fellow citizens will behave in a certain way.  Unfortunately, the thin veneer of civilization that we have all come to rely upon is steadily evaporating all over the globe, and chaos, crime and violence are all on the rise.
• Legend warns this will totally devastate the world and the window to safe yourself is closing
  With the price of gold and silver surging once again, even with the July 4th holiday in the United States, today the man who has become legendary for his predictions on QE, historic moves in currencies, and major global events, warned King World News that what is coming will totally devastate the world and the window for investors to save themselves is closing.
• Greeks See Wages and Pensions Slashed as New Round of Austerity Begins
  The summer of 2016 turns out to be another summer of discontent for Greek pensioners and wage earners who see their incomes slashed, as a new round of austerity begins after the imposition of the new bailout program measures. It was exactly the same time last year (June 28) when Greeks found that the banks were closed and capital controls were imposed, continuing through today. This year, the end of June found wage earners and pensioners fuming or despairing in front of the ATM when they saw that their bank balances where lower than anticipated. And for hundreds of thousands of pensioners, the amounts were significantly less, even 48 percent lower in some cases.
• America Has Become A Lawless Nation – Hillary Clinton Magically Cleared By The FBI
  It is hard to be proud to be an American today after watching FBI director James Comey magically clear Hillary Clinton of all wrongdoing.  Sadly, Comey is likely to go down in history as the man that struck the final death blow to the rule of law in America.  During his address to the media, Comey admitted that Clinton sent or received 110 emails in 52 email chains that contained classified material at the time they were sent.  But of course there were probably many more.  Comey told the press that it was “likely that there are other work-related emails that they did not produce … that are now gone because they deleted all emails they did not return to State, and the lawyers cleaned their devices.”  So basically Clinton turned over to the FBI whatever she felt like turning over, and then she destroyed the rest of the evidence.  As a former lawyer, this infuriates me, but it doesn’t surprise me.
• Sweden begins ball rolling to try to cut off gold acquisition by the masses as price begins to soar
  One of the major reasons why the bullion banks have been able to keep the price of gold and silver down over the past four years is because only 1% of Americans and Europeans actually own the physical metals, or have not changed their investing paradigms to seek intrinsic safe havens rather than trust in paper assets.  But since the beginning of the year, and with last week's ‘shot heard round the world' in the UK over their Brexit vote, central banks along with sovereign governments are now deathly afraid the people will finally wake up and rush to the door to get their hands on precious metals. And following the past two trading days of extreme movements upward in both gold and silver, one nation announced a sudden bank policy in which they will no longer allow bank deposits to be used to purchase gold or silver in an attempt to keep the masses from moving out of negative yield bonds and into real wealth protection.
• Gundlach: “When Deutsche Bank Goes To Single Digits People Will Start To Panic”
  Following today's Fed minutes release, Jeff Gundlach had a far less “uncertain” message: “Things are shaky and feeling dangerous,” Gundlach told Reuters in a telephone interview. It's not just stocks that Gundlach was not too excited about, he also had some choice words about buying Treasuries here. “You're seeing people who hated the ‘2 percent' 10-year suddenly loving it at a 1.38-1.39 percent revisit of the all-time low closing yield,” Gundlach said. “If you buy 10-year Treasuries now, I would say, it is a terrible trade location. In fact, it is the worst trade location in the history of the 10-year Treasury.”
• Italy Faces Fight to Shield Bank Investors in Rescue, Fitch Says
  Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi faces a battle to win European Union approval for a bank-rescue plan that protects investors from taking losses, according to Fitch Ratings. “We believe it will be difficult to reach the political consensus necessary to inject public funds as equity,” Fitch analysts Francesca Vasciminno and Cynthia Chan wrote in a note on Monday. EU state-aid rules, which normally require shareholders and junior creditors to share losses, can be waived in “exceptional circumstances” under the bloc’s treaties. Such an exemption requires unanimous approval by EU member states. Failing that, any injection of public funds under the bloc’s bank-failure law would be subject to state-aid rules.
• Post-Brexit turmoil: Osborne promises to cut corporate tax to less than 15%
  UK Chancellor George Osborne has outlined an ambitious plan to build a “super competitive economy” as Britain exits the European Union. His plan, among others, includes slashing the corporate tax to one of the lowest in any major economy. In an interview with Financial Times, Osborne stuck to his earlier warnings that a Brexit could tip the UK into a recession, but instead of dwelling on it, he said that he wanted a leading role in shaping the country's new economy path. He said Britain should “get on with it” to prove to investors that the country was still “open for business.” Prior to the EU referendum vote, the Chancellor, was tipped to be moving next door to 10 Downing Street. However, post-Brexit, he has made it clear that although he will not be seeking to take over Prime Minister David Cameron's role, he intended to steer the economy in a post-Brexit era.
• Jetoil: Another Greek Company Files for Bankruptcy
  Greek family business, Mamidoil Jetoil, is the latest in a chain of companies filing for bankruptcy according to article 99 of the Bankruptcy Code. The company dealing in storage, transport and trade of petroleum-based products in Greece and the Balkans was founded at the end of the Sixties by three brothers – Kyriakos, George and Nick Mamidakis. The company is following the same line adopted by Marinopoulos supermarket chain and filing for bankruptcy so as to receive temporary protection from its creditors. Recently, the company dealt with cash flow problems that caused it to streamline its operation and close down a number of its service stations due to an inability to pay suppliers.
• LEAKED: Japan’s Mega-Pension Fund Plows into Stocks, Eats $50Bn Loss, Tries to Hide it till after Election
  Abenomics is facing elections on July 10 for the less powerful Upper House. But Abenomics hasn’t fared very well. It engaged in the biggest (relative to the economy) money-printing and bond buying extravaganza the world has ever seen. The securities the Bank of Japan has bought, now at ¥426 trillion ($4.15 trillion), amount to 85% of GDP. About $8 trillion in Japanese Government Bonds sport negative yields. Even the 30-year yield is just about zero. The JGB market, once the second largest government bond market in the world, has frozen. The BOJ’s primary dealers are in revolt. Some have already pulled out. Savers are scared. Sales of safes to be installed at home have soared. There have been no structural reforms to speak of. Japan Inc. has benefited enormously, through various tax benefits and special stimulus packages, including foreign aid that is channeled back to Japanese companies. Government deficits are gigantic, providing additional stimulus for Japan Inc. And yet, the economy is languishing.
• Something Huge Is Coming From Japan
  Pretend, for a minute, that your country responds to the bursting of a credit bubble by borrowing unprecedented amounts of money and using it to prop up banks and construction companies. This doesn’t work, so you create record amounts of new money and push interest rates into negative territory in an attempt to devalue your currency. But this — amazingly — doesn’t work either. Your currency soars and the inflation you’d hoped to generate never materializes. Now what? Is there even anything left to try, or is it simply time to stand back and let the current system melt down? Those are the questions facing Japan, and the answers are not obvious. Here, for instance, is its inflation rate two years into the largest major-country money creation binge since Wiemar Germany.
• June Auto Sales Down 4.6%, Much Worse Than Expected
  Earlier today domestic auto sales came in a bit weaker than expected. Total numbers are now out. And they are much worse than expected. The Bloomberg Econoday consensus estimate for total vehicle sales in June was 17.3 million at a Seasonally Adjusted Annualized Rate (SAAR). The actual report shows 16.7 million SAAR sales.
• Price Discovery, R.I.P.
  That was quick. With nearly 85% of the Brexit loss recovered in three days and the market now up for the quarter and the year, what’s not to like? After all, the central banks are purportedly at the ready, and, in the case of the ECB and BOE, are already swinging into action according to their shills in the MSM.
• All the Oil We’ll Never Pump Out
  How many times have you read this line? Too many to count?  While it’s plainly true, it’s also deeply misleading. It ignores a glaring fact about the gobs of oil under our soil: most of it will never see the light of day. I’m about to take you through the numbers, so buckle up: Let’s assume that in 2016 Venezuela produces 2.4 million barrels of oil per day (these are round numbers, deal with it.)  Of these 2.4 million barrels, some 600 thousand barrels go to Chevy Caprices from 1980, (i.e., domestic consumption). That leaves 1.8 million barrels per day for exports, which is roughly $26 billion per year at $40/barrel – assuming we get paid in cash for oil exports!
• The Fed’s Final Bullet
  The Fed has no more maneuvers other than to jawbone the dollar lower. Because for a variety of reasons a strong dollar, in the current market environment, is akin to tighter monetary policy. And right now, in the wake of Brexit, tighter monetary policy is clearly not an option. Plus, a stronger dollar (by virtue of the “peg”) strengthens the Chinese Yuan and the Saudi Riyal… something neither country will tolerate. A monthly chart of USD-SAR – since the Riyal is pegged, this is essentially a straight line…but not always. Palpitations usually set in when a crisis is underway and oil prices are coming under pressure. The dollar’s whip-saw in 2016 has The Fed’s fingerprints all over it. The sequence is:  Flawed forward guidance of 4 rate hikes (US dollar ramp), followed by a slowing US economy (US dollar softens)… and now the Brexit/ global economic fears (US dollar rallies in “flight to quality”).
• When Government Controls All Wealth
  Stock markets continued their rebound on Wednesday. The Dow rose 284 points… or just over 1.5%. London’s FTSE 100 Index was up 3.6%. And Europe’s equivalent of the Dow, the Euro Stoxx 50, was up 2.7%. Investors have realized Brexit isn’t the end of the world. First, because they think it won’t really happen. After all, elites can fix elections, buy politicians, and control public policy… surely, they can fix this! A letter in the Financial Times reminds us that Swedish voters cast their ballots against nuclear power in 1980. The government just ignored them, doubling nuclear power generation over the next 36 years. Second, because investors see the panic over Brexit leading to more spirited intervention by central banks! The EZ money floodgates – already wide open – are to be opened wider. The U.S. has its QE program on hold, but Europe’s scheme is gushing like Niagara. Mario Draghi at the European Central Bank buys $90 billion a month in bonds. And he’s not only buying government bonds; he’s buying corporates, too.
• If the UK Economy Tanks, Don’t Blame Brexit
  Last Thursday, the people of Britain voted in a referendum to leave the European Union (EU). Most commentators view Britain’s exit (“Brexit”) from the European Union as bad news for economic growth in the UK and the euro zone. As a result, it is argued, the growth rate in the rest of the world will be also badly affected. t is more likely that, whether the pace of real economic growth over time will weaken or strengthen is going to be set by the pace of expansion in the pool of real wealth. A strengthening in the pace of economic growth implies a strengthening in the rate of growth of the pool of real wealth. Conversely, a weakening in the pace of economic growth implies a weakening in the rate of growth of the pool of real wealth.
• “You want to own gold” Mark Faber warns “Brexit is the excuse for QE4”
  “If Brexit is used as an excuse, the central banks will print more money, QE4 in the U.S. is on the way and the depreciation in the purchasing power of currencies will continue,” warned a vociferous Marc Faber said in a Bloomberg TV interview today from Hong Kong. “In that situation, you want to own some gold,” he explained, carefully noting that central planners will be forced into this move because, despite all their extreme experimentation, “global growth has contracted, in other words, growth rates have been reduced and many countries are in recession already.” This has nothing to do with Brexit, stated the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report editor, “Brexit is actually not about an end of globalization. On the contrary, it’s about people that rebel against the arrogant elite in the financial centers.”
• The subprime bubble grew by $1.4 trillion in just one month
  Now, I don’t see a whole lot of difference between 2008’s subprime home loan borrowers, versus 2016’s subprime government borrowers. Neither borrower has the financial means to repay its debts. Back in 2008 the banks loaned money to subprime borrowers under the false premise that ‘home prices always go up.’ Today investors buy the bonds of subprime governments based on the false premise that ‘governments always pay their debts.’ Both assumptions are completely absurd and defy even the most cursory lessons of financial history.
• Brexit will impact eurozone recovery: ECB board member
  The uncertainty sparked by the British vote to leave European Union will “inevitably” harm economic recovery in the euro area, European Central Bank executive board member Benoit Coeure said in a newspaper interview Friday. The pick-up in the eurozone economy “will inevitably suffer from the ‘uncertainty shock' that the British referendum has triggered, even if the impact is difficult to quantify at the moment,” Coeure told the French daily Le Monde. The effect would be all the more damaging because “the recovery in the euro area is already there. It's healthy and driven by domestic demand and by investment,” even it was being “kept down by high unemployment levels and debt,” he argued. The victory of the Leave vote in Britain last week has already led to severe turbulence on the financial markets.
• Scathing new report shows just how bankrupt Social Security really is
  Last week, a group of analysts published an astonishing report about the future of Social Security in the United States, and their remarks were nothing short of damning. According to their calculations, for example, these analysts claim that Social Security is already running a huge deficit to the tune of tens of billions of dollars each year. In fact, this Social Security funding deficit has been taking place for several years now, and it’s actually accelerating. So the problem worsens each year. According to the analysis, the astounding rise in Social Security recipients vastly outpaces any growth in tax revenue received into the program. And this trend will continue for decades. The report goes on to describe Social Security’s two main trust funds, OASI (for ‘Old Age Survivors Insurance’) and DI (‘Disability Insurance’). They tell us that DI actually went bust several months ago.
• What’s behind Venezuela’s economic crisis?
  Tomorrow in Venezuela, President Nicolas Maduro will end electricity rationing that begun in April, following a drought that affected water levels at the hydroelectric dam that provides most of the country’s power.  The rationing has cut off electricity to much of the country for fours a day. Still, Venezuelans are struggling with shortages of food, medicine and other necessities, with increasing finger pointing at Maduro’s leadership. For more on these challenges, “New York Times” reporter Nicholas Casey joins me via Skype from the nation’s capital, Caracas. Nicholas, the pictures and the stories that we’ve seen have been really tragic.  I mean, we’re talking about people rioting for food.  Has that basic need got any closer to being met?
• The Collapse of Western Democracy — Paul Craig Roberts
  There is controversy around the statement attributed to Martin Schulz, president of the EU parliament: “The British have broken the rules. It is not the philosophy of the EU that the crowd
  can determine its fate.” This statement attributed to Schulz comes from a German language magazine. Here is the statement in German: “Die Briten verstoßen gegen die EU-Rahmenbedingungen, da es nicht in der Philosophie der EU liegt, dass der Mob über Aufstieg und Untergang der EU entscheiden darf.” This does translate to the English above. However, it appears that the statement was from a satire, whether of Schulz or the EU I do not know. I also do not know whether Schulz’s views justify the satirical jab or whether the words were assigned to him because of his position. Nevertheless, the fact that apparantly it was satire was lost in the transmission chain.
• Russia & China Met Twice Last Week to Propose Monetary Reset – Willem Middelkoop
  Russia and Chinese leaders met twice during last week and called (again) for an end to the current (dollar) system.From my contacts with Chinese insiders I know they really understand our problems well and are clearly preparing for The Next Phase (a monetary and geopolitical reset…
• Gerald Celente – This Is Bigger Than Brexit
  Although stocks bounced back on “Turnaround Tuesday” on the belief that contagion has been contained following the rout that wiped out $3.6 trillion from equity markets following Great Britain’s referendum last Thursday to “Brexit” the European Union… we disagree. It’s bigger than Brexit… Despite many of the world’s largest hedge funds betting billions on a “Remain” victory and British bookies putting the chances of “Leave” at barely 10 percent, in my June 15 KWN interview I said, “Should the ‘Leave’ vote win, we forecast the US dollar and gold prices will spike while equity markets, particularly those currently under downward pressure, will sink deeply lower.” Since then, gold hit two-year highs, the British pound fell to 31-year lows and currencies around the world hit new lows against the US dollar – or tested old ones – as investors sought safe-haven assets such as the dollar and Japanese yen.
• SILVER JUST TOOK OUT $20: “We are at a flashpoint in history” — Andy Hoffman
  Silver just took out $20 in Sunday night Globex trading, but that’s not all, silver briefly pierced $21 Sunday night before settling back to the mid $20’s. Andy Hoffman from Miles Franklin joins me for a Sunday update and warns, “We are at a flashpoint in history… there is literally a tiny, tiny window left for people to protect themselves before all hell breaks loose.”
• Could This Rumor About China Be True? Plus The Latest On Gold, Silver, Brexit, Soros And More
  With global markets continuing to experience wild trading in the aftermath of the historic Brexit vote, here is a quick update on the war in the gold and silver markets, the latest end of quarter rumors, plus gold, silver, Brexit and more.
• Can This Be True? Is The Price Of Silver Really Headed To A Jaw-Dropping $690?
  With the price of silver surging near $19 and the gold market holding recent gains at $1,320, the following was sent to King World News from analyst David P. out of Europe.  The work below is not David’s and we are not sure if it comes from a colleague or not but it is worth featuring because of the astonishing price target that it sets for the price of silver.
• Heal Yourself 101 – Learn to live the way you were designed
  Everything you need to know on how to dramatically change your life and never get sick again. Many people who have done this have had dramatic results with everything from impotence to brain cancer. This isn’t a trendy fad diet, it’s an understanding on how to live the way we were designed. Explained in simple-to-understand language, this book gets straight to the point. You can change your life with simple things that cost almost nothing, right in your own home, starting immediately. This book was shared in the ‘10 Steps To Avoid The Crash‘ guide. Heal Yourself 101 was available for $29.97 and for a short period of time it is available in PDF format for free.
• Doug Casey Debunks the Common Excuses for Staying In One Country
  Tell a person that it's a big beautiful world, full of fresh opportunities and a sense of freedom that is just not available by staying put and you will inevitably be treated to a litany of reasons why expanding your life into more than one country just isn't practical. Let's consider some of those commonly stated reasons, and why they might be unjustified. While largely directed at Americans, these are also applicable to pretty much anyone from any country.
• Warning: This Could Be the Start of a Global Banking Crisis 
  Europe’s banking system is collapsing. Over the past year, shares of Deutsche Bank (DB), Germany’s biggest bank, have plunged 56%. Swiss banking giant Credit Suisse (CS) is down 62% over the same period. Yesterday, both stocks hit record lows. Dozens of other European bank stocks have also crashed. The Euro STOXX Banks, which tracks 48 of Europe’s largest banks, is down 48% over the past year. This is a major issue. That's because banks are the cornerstone of the financial system. They keep money flowing through the economy. If they’re struggling, it often means the economy is having major problems. Right now, European banks are flashing bright warning signs. That’s not just bad news for Europe—it’s also a serious threat to the rest of the world.
• What does the Brexit mean for the global oil market?
  The voters’ decision to leave the EU has created a global ripple effect. The global oil market is now getting ready for a longer delay in investments and pricing suppression, an economic slowdown not needed at the time. Immediately, the value of a pound dropped to a thirty-year low of $1.34, the price of Brent fell 5%, and the world’s stock exchanges experienced a plunge.
• Do emerging markets like Brexit?
  Who’s afraid of a big bad Brexit? Not emerging markets who have been through days of strong growth, including having currencies buoyed against the US dollar since Britain voted to leave the European Union last week. In Brazil, the currency real opened 2.16 per cent stronger against the US dollar on Wednesday, reaching its highest level in 2016. It was a similar picture for the Mexican, Chilean and Colombian pesos. Meanwhile, the Russian ruble appeared to have regained considerable ground reaching its strongest against the US dollar since October last year. The benchmark Russian exchange MICEX continued its second day of gains, growing 1.3 per cent in similar fashion to markets in other emerging economies. Overall, while most global markets roiled as Brexit caused $3 trillion in investments to be shaved off exchanges around the world, emerging economies fared better.
• Oil Crashes on Brexit, Oil Imports at a 42 Month High, Record Gasoline Output and Usage 
  Oil prices crashed along with global financial markets on Friday following the British vote on Thursday to exit the European Union (typically referred to as “Brexit”), which is widely expected to precipitate a period of political instability in Europe.  Conservative British Prime Minister David Cameron, who had campaigned for remaining in the EU, submitted his resignation; British Labor Party leader Jeremy Corbyn also faces a no-confidence vote, as both major parties had campaigned to remain in the EU.  In response to the British vote, populist parties on the left and right across Europe are calling for referendums in their own countries, with speculation that France, the Netherlands, Austria, Finland and Hungary might also vote to leave the EU, effectively rebalkanizing the continent.
• Brexit BOOM: FTSE 100 leaps to HIGHEST level since 2015 just a week after EU referendum
  BRITAIN's top stock market has surged to its highest level in almost a year, just one week after the vote to leave the European Union (EU). The FTSE 100 jumped again in Friday trading to sit at around 6,577 – its highest level since August 2015. The index has been climbing since Tuesday as confidence recovered from the initial shock over the outcome of the referendum. Despite experiencing one of the most volatile weeks since the 2008 financial crisis, the FTSE posted its best week since December 2, 2011, making gains of 7.15 per cent.
• NIRP Absurdity Soars after Brexit, Hits $11.7 Trillion
  The amount of government bonds that sport negative yields – an all-too-real absurdity where bondholders in effect are shanghaied into paying the government for the privilege of lending it money – has soared 12.5% after the Brexit vote, from $10.4 trillion at the end of May to $11.7 trillion as June 27, Fitch Ratings reported today. The action was in longer-dated bonds, with maturities of 7 years and over. Those with negative yields soared to $2.635 trillion, up 62% from the end of May and up 93% from the end of April, having nearly doubled in two months! The German 10-year yield fell below zero during the period, now at -0.124%. Japanese yields are below zero all the way out to 17 years. And “virtually all” of the Swiss sovereign debt luxuriates in negative yields.
• Cryptocurrency Crash
  One of the more profitable trades this year was in the cryptocurrency Bitcoin. For those unfamiliar, Bitcoin is a digital asset and payment system — a virtual currency. It’s considered a cryptocurrency because it doesn’t require a central bank to handle its transactions. It’s all self-contained through technology that encrypts and records a ledger over a distributed computer system. This technology is called the blockchain. The benefit of blockchain technology comes from its transparency. Everyone can see every transaction. The whole system is also decentralized. There’s no single institution or bank that controls the transferring of assets back and forth. This (advocates claim) removes the possibility of corruption, theft, and a whole host of other common problems that come with your standard financial system.
• It Gets Real: Manhattan Apartment Sales Plunge
  Real estate is local. And so housing bubbles are local. When enough of them happen, they coagulate into a national phenomenon. This has already happened. In March 2013, we started calling this phenomenon Housing Bubble 2, and we’ve watched in awe how it bloomed, nurtured by ultra-low mortgage rates, government subsidies, the Fed that is relentlessly “healing” the housing market, yield-desperate investors, private equity firms, Wall Street, a surge of foreign buyers who want to get their money – however they’d obtained it – out of harm’s way, and a million other factors. All of it has been accompanied by a national boom in hype. Now there are signs that our awe-inspiring Housing Bubble 2, like all housing bubbles, is beginning to unravel. This too is local, here and there, while still booming in other places. It shows up in some key markets. Then it spreads. When it spreads far enough, the unraveling of Housing Bubble 2 becomes a national phenomenon.
• How Can We Celebrate Our Independence When Most Americans Are Willingly Enslaved To The Matrix?
  Did you know that the average U.S. adult consumes 10 hours and 39 minutes of media a day?  Nielsen has just released brand new numbers on the media consumption patterns of Americans, and they are absolutely staggering.  According to Nielsen, the amount of media that we consume per day has increased by an hour just since the first quarter of 2015.  This is the time of the year when we celebrate our independence, but how in the world can we ever be truly independent when most of us are willingly plugging ourselves into “the Matrix” for more than 10 hours a day?  If you feed anything into your mind for hours every day, it is going to change the way that you think, the way that you feel about things, and the way that you view the world.  This endless barrage of “news” and “entertainment” has fundamentally altered the belief systems of tens of millions of Americans, and this has very serious implications for our society moving forward.
• Rio 2016: ‘Welcome to Hell' warn police
  There was a nasty surprise awaiting passengers in the arrivals hall at Rio de Janeiro's Galeao International Airport on Monday. Along with the relatives carrying flowers and taxi drivers waiting with name boards there were lines of off-duty police with banners that had a far more ominous message: “Welcome to Hell”. “Police and firefighters don't get paid,” the banners, in English and Portuguese, went on. “Whoever comes to Rio de Janeiro will not be safe”. Photos of the protest have been widely shared on social media and in the Brazilian press. The image above was posted on the photo sharing site Imgur, where it was viewed more than three million times in less than a day.
• Puerto Rico Says It Will Default Even With Congressional Aid
  Two days before a potential historical default, Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla made it clear that the commonwealth won’t pay bondholders even as Congress votes on a bill allowing the island to restructure its $70 billion in debt. “On July 1, 2016, Puerto Rico will default on more than $1 billion in general obligation bonds, the island’s senior credits protected by a constitutional lien on revenues,” Garcia Padilla wrote in a editorial posted on a CNBC website. The lapse will mark the first time the U.S. territory has failed to pay what it owes on general-obligation debt, a $13 billion swath that its constitution says has the top claim to the government’s funds. Garcia Padilla previously said the commonwealth couldn’t raise enough to cover what’s owed to bondholders even if he shut down the government. The island has about $2 billion in principal and interest payments due Friday.
• Millennials Are Pretty Cocky About Their Investing Skills
  One of the great things about young people is their optimism, the confidence that everything is going to work out. Sometimes, though, that can get them into trouble, like behind the wheel of a car. Or as an investor. A new survey found millennials were more positive about the future than their parents when it came to investments. They also think themselves far more knowledgeable about how to manage money, which, as anyone will tell you, might translate into behavior that leads to bad financial outcomes.
• World-Check terrorism database exposed online
  A financial crime database used by banks has been “leaked” on to the net. World-Check Risk Screening contains details about people and organisations suspected of being involved in terrorism, organised crime and money laundering, among other offences. Access is supposed to be restricted under European privacy laws. The database's creator, Thomson Reuters, has confirmed an unnamed third-party exposed an “out of date” version online. But it says the material has since been removed. Security researcher Chris Vickery said he discovered the leak. He notified the Register, which reported that it contained more than two million records and was two years old.
• Repo Rates Surge to Post-Crisis High as Bank Dealers Pare Back
  The rate for borrowing and lending government debt surged Thursday to the highest since the financial crisis as banks reined in collateral lending to shore up balance sheets ahead of the quarter-end. With fewer dealers borrowing cash and posting government debt as collateral, money funds — the key lenders of cash in the repurchase agreement market — gravitated to buying Treasury bills and parking cash with the Fed via their RRPs during quarter-end, driving overnight rates higher.
• Richmond Fed Dead-Cat-Bounce Crashes To 3-Year Lows
  With the biggest miss in two years, Richmond Fed collapsed to -7 (lowest since Jan 2013) from March's 22 print (six year highs). The farcical flip-flop leaves the average workweek plunging into contraction, number of employees dropping, New Order volume crashing, and worse still, future expectations of hisring and work week is plunging. Best in 6 years to worst in over 3 years…
• Forget December. Forget Next Year. The Fed's Done Hiking Until 2018
  Circle Jan. 31, 2018, on the calendar. That’s the soonest the Federal Reserve hikes next. At least if money market derivatives are to be believed. Traders, who have consistently been better at projecting the path of interest rates than the Fed itself, are now pricing in a greater probability that policy makers will cut rates in upcoming meetings than raise them. They don’t assign more than a 50 percent chance of an increase until the beginning of 2018, and don’t price in a full rate hike until the final quarter of the year.
• The Recent Rise in Delinquency Rates on Bank Loans Is Shocking (Is a New Banking Crisis Imminent?)
  The delinquency rate on loans is key in understanding banking. It answers one question: what percentage of loans is overdue for payment? The delinquency rate is by far the most useful indicator for “credit stress.” It seems, however, as if delinquency no longer counts. Few are paying attention to the quick and sudden rise of the delinquency rate. What does it tell us and is a new banking crisis imminent? This Is What Happened after Janet Yellen Hiked the Fed Funds Rate in December. I have said it many times over and I will repeat it here: the last time around, it took Fed-chairman Alan Greenspan over two years and seventeen rate hikes to bring the Fed funds rate from a then all-time-low of 1% to 5.25%, before the U.S. economy suffered the worst recession since the 1930s. We are not so lucky this time.
• April Spending Exuberance Plunges Back To Earth In May As Income Growth Slows
  After an exuberant April, spiking hope that everything was awesome with a surge in spending, May has dragged US consumers back down to earth. The 1.1% (revised) jump in spending in April (highest since Aug 09) is over as May's 0.4% gain is back in the land of ‘normal' once again. Income rose just 0.2% MoM (less than expected) slowing dramatically from last month to near the weakest YoY growth since March 2014. The savings rate fell once again on the back of this (down 0.1%) to 5.3%. With YoY Income growth almost the weakest since March 2014 and spending fading…
• Pending home sales down 3.7%, marking first annual drop in two years
  The final push of the spring housing season turned out weaker than expected. Signed contracts to buy existing homes fell 3.7 percent in May compared to April, according to the National Association of Realtors. April's reading was revised down. These so-called pending home sales were 0.2 percent lower than May of 2015, the first annual drop since August of 2014. “With demand holding firm this spring and homes selling even faster than a year ago, the notable increase in closings in recent months took a dent out of what was available for sale in May and ultimately dragged down contract activity,” said Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the Realtors. “Realtors are acknowledging with increasing frequency lately that buyers continue to be frustrated by the tense competition and lack of affordable homes for sale in their market.”
• API Claims A 3.9 Million Barrel Draw 
  The latest inventory report by the American Petroleum Institute injected some optimism into crude oil markets, suggesting that U.S. stockpiles fell by as much as 3.9 million barrels in the week to June 24. This is significantly more than the 2.4 million barrels seen by analysts polled by Reuters and the sixth consecutive week of inventory draws, should the API information be confirmed by the official figures that will be released later today by the Energy Information Administration. Last week, the API said inventories had plummeted by 5.2 million barrels in the week to June 17, but EIA data revealed that the draw was much more moderate, at less than a million barrels.
• East Coast Ports Hit By Import Decline
  Imports slumped at some of the East Coast’s busiest ports in May, as high business inventories and shifting trade patterns that favor the West Coast curbed volumes. On Tuesday the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey reported that May loaded imports fell to 268,861 twenty-foot equivalent units – a common measure of shipping container volume – down 4.7% from the same month last year. The total volume of containers passing through the port fell by 6.1% in May.
• Chiacgo PMI Spikes To 18-Month High – 7 Standard-Deviation Beat – As Employment Crashes?!
  Seriously!! Chicago PMI spiked to 56.8 in June (from 49.3) – higher than the highest estimate and seven standard deviations above expectations. This is the highest since Jan 2015. Simply put, the number is beyond any credibility, as despite higher orders and output, demand for labor fell as employment contracted at the fastest pace since November 2009.
• Carney prepares for ‘economic post-traumatic stress’
  The Bank of England is preparing to unleash another round of monetary stimulus as it battles to contain the economic fallout of The UK’s decision to leave EU. In a stark warning to politicians, governor Mark Carney said a downturn was on its way and Britain was already suffering from “economic post-traumatic stress disorder”. He said the central bank would take “whatever action is needed to support growth”, which probably included “some monetary policy easing” in the next few months, in an attempt to reassure the markets and the general public. But Mr Carney also said that central bankers could do only a limited amount to mitigate the pain.
• “You Want To Own Gold” Marc Faber Warns “Brexit Is The Excuse For QE4”
  “If Brexit is used as an excuse, the central banks will print more money, QE4 in the U.S. is on the way and the depreciation in the purchasing power of currencies will continue,” warned a vociferous Marc Faber said in a Bloomberg TV interview today from Hong Kong. “In that situation, you want to own some gold,” he explained, carefully noting that central planners will be forced into this move because, despite all their extreme experimentation, “global growth has contracted, in other words, growth rates have been reduced and many countries are in recession already.” This has nothing to do with Brexit, stated the Gloom, Boom & Doom Report editor, “Brexit is actually not about an end of globalization. On the contrary, it’s about people that rebel against the arrogant elite in the financial centers.”
• What are my choices?
  Pastor Williams has asked me to share with you this information from an unknown source regarding your choice in the upcoming November presidential election. Please share it with everyone you can. If I were not already convinced this message would have convinced me. It is also a good read as it makes its points!
• Hillary Clinton says American 401(k)s lost $100 billion after Brexit vote
  In a speech attacking her opponent, Hillary Clinton said Donald Trump cheered while the economy reeled in the aftermath of Britain’s shocking vote to leave the European Union. “On Friday, when Britain voted to leave the European Union, he crowed from his golf course about how the disruption could end up creating higher profits for that golf course, even though, within 24 hours, Americans lost $100 billion from our 401(k)s,” Clinton said in Ohio June 27. “He tried to turn a global economics challenge into an infomercial.” Trump did say last week that Brexit would benefit Turnberry, his golf course in Scotland, because a weaker pound would bring more tourists. We wondered, though, about the other part of Clinton’s claim: that Brexit caused 50 million Americans with 401(k) retirement savings accounts to lose $100 billion in just 24 hours.
• ‘The end is coming,' says Ron Paul
  The historic U.K. vote to leave the European Union is a sign of a major global meltdown, not just a watershed that marks the end of a unified continent, former Rep. Ron Paul says. “I think [the EU] will become nonfunctional,” Paul told CNBC's ” Futures Now ” on Tuesday. “It really is coming to an end. It doesn't mean tomorrow or the next day, but people are going to be really unhappy. The end is coming, but it isn't coming because of the breakup,” he added. Paul attributed the fallout to “bad fiscal policies” around the globe. He said that as long as interest rates remain low, the markets will remain in bubble territory.
• Brexit will allow insurers to escape ‘absolutely dreadful' EU regulation, claims former civil service chief
  British-based insurers may be better off outside the EU because capital rules have damaged competitiveness and constrained the sector's ability to expand, according to the former head of the civil service. Lord Turnbull, who served as a non-executive director at Prudential for almost a decade, described the regulatory framework, known as Solvency II, as “absolutely dreadful”. Solvency II has drawn widespread criticism from the industry and UK regulators, which have warned that the high costs of implementing the framework have so far failed to level the playing field in the sector. Lord Turnbull said the UK's decision to leave the EU could benefit the industry.
• This economist thinks China is headed for a 1929-style depression
  Andy Xie isn’t known for tepid opinions. The provocative Xie, who was a top economist at the World Bank and Morgan Stanley, found notoriety a decade ago when he left the Wall Street bank after a controversial internal report went public. Today, he is among the loudest voices warning of an inevitable implosion in China, the world’s second-largest economy. Xie, now working independently and based in Shanghai, says the coming collapse won’t be like the Asian currency crisis of 1997 or the U.S. financial meltdown of 2008. In a recent interview with MarketWatch, Xie said China’s trajectory instead resembles the one that led to the Great Depression, when the expansion of credit, loose monetary policy and a widespread belief that asset prices would never fall contributed to rampant speculation that ended with a crippling market crash.
• UK faith leaders unite in condemning post-referendum rise in xenophobic abuse
  Leaders of Britain’s main faith communities have united in condemning intolerance amid mounting reports of xenophobic and racist abuse in the wake of the EU referendum result. The Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, the Catholic archbishop of Westminster, the chief rabbi and senior imams have all spoken out against division and expressions of hatred. In Brussels, the United Nations human rights chief said he was deeply concerned about reports of attacks on minority communities and foreigners. Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein urged the UK authorities to prosecute those responsible, saying racism and xenophobia were “completely, totally and utterly unacceptable in any circumstances”. Police recorded a 57% increase in hate crime complaints in the four days following the referendum, in which immigration was a key plank of the leave campaign. Justin Welby, the leader of the Church of England, said people of “evil will” were using the referendum result as an excuse to vent their hatred.
• Another Case For Exit——-America Should Get Out Of NATO
  In its reporting on Brexit, the New York Times asks an interesting question: “Is the post-1945 order imposed on the world by the United States and its allies unraveling, too?” Hopefully, it will mean the unraveling of two of the most powerful and destructive governmental apparatuses that came out of the postwar era: NATO and the U.S. national-security state. In fact, although the mainstream media and the political establishment elites will never acknowledge it, the irony is that it is these two apparatuses that ultimately led to the Brexit vote.
• 16 Reasons to Celebrate Brexit’s Win
  Watching the Brexit campaign generated mixed feelings: it was a little like the man who saw his mother-in-law drive his new Mercedes off a cliff. In the United Kingdom, some people who hated free trade, immigration and market innovation challenged the officious, wannabe superstate headquartered in Brussels. Who to cheer for? We should cheer for the Brexiteers, who deserve at least a couple of hurrahs. The European Union created a common market throughout the continent, an undoubted good, but since then has focused on becoming a meddling Leviathan like Washington, DC. For Britain, the virtues of remaining appeared to pale in comparison to the likely costs of continued subservience to Brussels. In a variety of imperfect ways, Brexit promoted liberty, community, democracy and the rule of law. In short, the good guys won.

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