Bull Market Weekly Update: A Predictable Pullback

Bitcoin, Silicon Valley, and The Future of Money

Outspoken bitcoin bull and noted Silicon Valley investor Tim Draper joins Thiel Macro’s Mike Green for a discussion on how the worlds of venture capital and crypto are colliding. 

The two investors also discuss crypto's potential impact on fiat currency, and the ways in which new rules and regulations could alter the future of trading.

- Source, Real Vision Finance

Will Central Banks Use QE to Prevent a Liquidity Crisis?

Michael Howell, founder and managing director of Crossborder Capital, joins Real Vision to talk about his views on global liquidity and capital flows. 

He says that the global economy is sputtering, and that central banks will have to reengage in quantitative easing in order to inject liquidity into markets. Howell argues that this will ultimately lead to rallies in equities, gold, bonds and bitcoin.

- Source, Real Vision Finance

The Wolf Report: Snapback Bloodletting in the Overripe Bond Market

The 10-year US Treasury yield rips. Unstoppable negative yields become stoppable.

- Source, The Wolf Report

Binyamin Appelbaum: The Problem With Modern Economics

Why do we have the economic policies we do today? These policies drive decision-making on Capitol Hill, corporate boardrooms, and on Wall Street. 

But who made them, why, and how did they come about? And how well are they serving us? 

Binyamin Appelbaum has made these questions the focus of his new book The Economists' Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets and the Fracture of Society, which shines a bright light on the rise of modern Economics and its dominating influence on society. 

From anti-trust law to central banking, Appelbaum explains how Economics has evolved (metastasized?) into its current form, where the solutions it now offers may be no better (and possibly substantially worse) than the problems it's designed to address.

- Source, Peak Prosperity

Kyle Bass on China's Major Risks and Opportunities

Legendary investor Kyle Bass, the founder of Hayman Capital, joins Real Vision’s Grant Williams for a deep dive into China. 

From shifting capital flows around the world to the threat of China devaluing the yuan, these two discuss threats and opportunities that China presents investors now.

- Source, Real Vision Finance

The Era Of Central Banks Pushing The Economy Forward Is Ending

Today's guest, Charles Hugh Smith, shares his thoughts on how capitalism as we have know it is being challenge. 

During our discussion he shares his thoughts on how monetary policy makes it hard for citizens to save and invest because there's now a problem with then earning little to no interest.

- Source, Silver Doctors

Why the Fed is stuck between a rock and a hard place

The world has seen a “paradigm shift” where nothing is the same as before, and the Fed has difficult choices to make, says Will Rhind, CEO of GraniteShares. 

“On the one hand you could make the case for, which obviously the president would make, that yes, interest rates are too high and it’s now against the backdrop of almost zero if not zero or negative rates in other countries and the U.S. is at a competitive disadvantage. 

On the other hand, you could say that even now with the rates coming down, the rates are still very, very low by historical standards and it’s still a nightmare for savers and for anybody that’s looking for income in the market,” Rhind told Kitco News.

- Source, Kitco News

Silver Looking Good But What Will it Take to Hit $50?

It may take another miracle to hit $50 an ounce for silver, said Todd Horwitz, chief strategist of BubbaTrading.com, but another analyst offers a different view. 

“I think it’s going to be more of an organized rally but you never know. Once the big money comes into these markets, these markets really move. We saw quite a bit of funds flow into platinum, platinum’s up $35 today, and that’s a smaller market,” said Phil Streible, senior market strategist of RJO Futures. 

Streible added that while a parabolic move for silver may occur, he doesn’t see it happening quite yet.

- Source, Kitco News

USA Watchdog: Bad Guys Won't Be Allowed to Keep Stolen Wealth

Federal Reserve watcher Wayne Jett wrote about the Fed, “The Fruits of Graft,” and says the bad guys are not going to be able to keep all the vast wealth that has been stolen out of the United States. 

Trump signed an Executive Order in December 2017 that allows the Treasury to freeze assets of people engaged in “human rights abuse and corruption.” Jett thinks this is a way to cushion the fall for the masses in turbulent political and economic times. 

Jett explains, “There has been a great deal of theft of gold at various levels. There has also been a great deal of fortunes built in such things as the drug trade and all of which relates to the corruption of the Executive Order you and I spoke about.

It was signed in 2017 to declare a national emergency related to human trafficking and corruption. I think a great deal of wealth has been confiscated or at least frozen.

That wealth is frozen and subject to confiscation. Our military has, I think, been used to recover large amounts of stolen gold. 

We have to wait and see how successful President Trump has been in making recovery of assets.”

- Source, USA Watchdog

Ron Paul: Delusions of Grandeur, Socialism is A Fool's Errand

It's hard enough to plan and manage one's own individual life, is it not? It's foolish to think you can even plan the life of another single individual... 

You can't!... 

But to believe that you can plan the lives of hundreds of millions of people? This is a complete fantasy!

- Source, Liberty Report

Euro zone inflation unchanged in August, more ammo for ECB to ease monetary policy

Euro zone inflation remained low at 1.0% in August, well below the European Central Bank’s target, a first estimate showed on Friday, bolstering market expectations that the bank will further ease monetary policy next month.

The European Union’s statistics office said on Friday that inflation in the 19 countries sharing the euro was unchanged from the July reading, in line with expectations in a Reuters poll.

The rates of price increases in July and August are the lowest since November 2016, well below the ECB’s inflation target of below, but close to, 2% despite years of unprecedented monetary stimulus through rate cuts and trillions of euros of bond purchases.

Economists said the latest economic data strengthened the case for further loosening monetary policy.

“There is nothing in today’s data releases to change the minds of ECB policymakers meeting the week after next: we still expect them to cut the deposit rate from -0.4% to -0.5% and to provide further strong hints that more QE is on the way,” Capital Economics’ Andrew Kenningham wrote in a note.

The ECB’s Governing Council holds its next monetary policy meeting on Sept. 12 and has all but promised a stimulus package, with economic growth faltering amid a global trade war and Germany’s manufacturing sector already in recession.

Market expectations are that it will carry out several interest rate cuts in the coming year, along with a fresh round of bond purchases, commonly known as quantitative easing.

The ECB’s measures are also set to include a way to compensate commercial banks for the side effects of negative interest rates.

Core inflation, which strips out volatile unprocessed food and energy and which the ECB scrutinises in policy decisions, was steady at 1.1% in August.

The even narrower measure excluding also alcohol and tobacco prices that many market economists look at was unchanged at 0.9%.

Eurostat’s flash estimate for the month does not include a monthly calculation.

The low overall level of inflation strengthens the case for a package of ECB measures to support the economy and faster inflation.

The ECB’s problem is that inflation has undershot its target since 2013 despite a lengthy economic boom, which saw the creation of over 10 million jobs.

Such an expansion should have fuelled inflation already but hidden slack in the labour market, the growing share of services in the economy and the population’s ageing, all kept a lid on price growth.

While the bank has argued that inflation would eventually come, it has already exhausted much of its firepower and now faces economic turbulence with a relatively depleted arsenal that could force it to once again to reinvent its policy toolkit.

The ECB is also facing the added difficulty that much of the current economic weakness is due to external factors, such as Brexit, a trade war and China’s own slowdown, against which monetary policy is largely ineffective.

While the ECB is unlikely to admit that the current troubles are outside its control, economists say that the best it can hope for is to prop up confidence and preserve already favourable financing conditions...

- Source, Reuters