Get On the Road to Riches Today

It was bound to happen.  Yesterday’s selloff, that is.

Gold most notably laid a gigantic egg – in addition to the one it laid Friday – falling below $1,330.  The stock market took one look at the bullion market and then decided to take an enormous swan dive…the S&P 500 finished the day down 36 points and the DOW down 265 points.

On top of that, it was the 100-year anniversary of the income tax – what any thinking man will conclude is nothing short of government mandated property confiscation.  But then, just when it seemed the day couldn’t possibly get worse…it did.  A giant explosion went off at the Boston Marathon.  Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims.

Certainly, we’ll continue to peer through our economic prism at the world around us as we connect the dots of apparent chaos…starting with today’s ruminations…

Have you ever heard of the spring swoon?

We never had…until last Friday.  From what we gather, it’s a name for what happens when, following a strong first quarter, the economy slumps over in the second quarter like a half empty flour sack on a bakery floor. Continue reading

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Just a Few Nuts a Day Makes All the Difference

Did you know that one in six Americans age 65 and older lives in poverty?

We discovered this while doing research for a new publication we’re working on about how to retire rich.  Quite frankly, we find this figure to be a shocking disgrace.  But what’s more, President Obama’s proposing to Mickey Mouse down the Social Security inflation adjustment.

The crux of the new adjustment is some academic hogwash called “chained-CPI.”  The whole premise of chained-CPI is that when the price of one thing goes up you can offset it by buying more of something else.  For example, when apples go up people can buy oranges, when Coke goes up they can buy Pepsi, and when tuna goes up…there’s always cat food.

No doubt, Obama’s being forced to do this by powers well beyond his control.  You see, the Social Security System was doomed to fail from the get go. Continue reading

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Clogging Up the Economy

By most accounts, as the season turned from winter to spring in 2013, economic recovery was ready to bloom.  The economy’s fields had been tilled and planted with care…housing was finally on the upswing.  Plus, the Federal Reserve was sprinkling its monetary fertigation at an EZ flow rate of $85 billion per month.

Everyone just knew the next big economic growth would appear at any moment.  In fact, if you skipped a blink, you could already see it.  What’s more, you could almost taste the forthcoming fruits of an abundant and bountiful summer harvest.

The stock market, that forward looking animal, was already investing borrowed capital and counting the unearned returns that would surely be generated by future profits.  New highs were being hit nearly every day.  Suckers were even buying stocks again.

How couldn’t they?  Suckers always buy high and sell low.  New all-time highs were the perfect carrot to bait them back in at just the imperfect moment.

Then, just when everyone least expected it, something rather displeasing happened.  Economic wheat rust appeared last Friday like grade school head lice. Continue reading

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The Biggest Baddest Bubble of All

“The Fed is ‘like a wet blanket all over the economy,”’ said David Stockman on The Daily Ticker on Tuesday.  “Everything is being micromanaged by them … they will fail and take private enterprise economy down with it.”

The former Reagan budget director, private equity investor and author was busy this week promoting his new book, The Great Deformation: The Corruption of Capitalism in America.  In fact, Stockman started off the week with a Sunday New York Times op-ed, which explores many of the themes covered in this newsletter.

It’s quite a lengthy article.  Nonetheless, it’s well worth your perusal.  You can read it here.

In the meantime, we’ll quote Stockman’s closing statement…

“The United States is broke — fiscally, morally, intellectually — and the Fed has incited a global currency war (Japan just signed up, the Brazilians and Chinese are angry, and the German-dominated euro zone is crumbling) that will soon overwhelm it.  When the latest [stock market] bubble pops, there will be nothing to stop the collapse. Continue reading

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