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Stewart Dougherty: Government Bail-Ins, Asset Confiscations And The Gold Sword Of Self-Defense

Financial Markets, Gold, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, U.S. Economy, , , ,

[Preface: In Part 1 of our report, “Goldman to Trump: Situation Assessment, Government Bail-ins and the Precious Metals Threat,” we inferred what Goldman Sachs’s second in command Gary Cohn might have said to President-elect Trump during their meeting on November 29, 2016. Cohn met again with Mr. Trump on December 2, 2016, and this time, we have inferred that he was accompanied by a second person. Here is Part 2 of our intuited, fictional report.]

Mr. Cohn: It is a pleasure to see you once again, Mr. Trump. I have been pre-empted. I was asked by important friends of our firm to introduce to you their envoy, Dr. Hugo Ehrlich. I can vouch for the fact that he represents extraordinarily powerful people with whom you will be working closely going forward. Let me turn it over to Dr. Ehrlich so he can explain.”

Dr. Ehrlich: “Thank you for meeting with me, Mr. Trump. Our time is short, so let’s respect it and get straight to business.

“I represent a global, privately held corporation known as Globanque. I doubt you have heard of it; we have a strict code of secrecy and silence. Globanque’s Directors would like to congratulate you on becoming president of the largest corporation in the world, the United States Government. Globanque, which owns the Bank for International Settlements and has meaningful stakes in numerous governments and other corporations, is also the majority shareholder of USG, Inc. Our friends at Goldman are intimately familiar with USG, Inc.’s ownership structure, because several years ago they helped Globanque acquire its controlling interest of your nation.

“While the Globanque Board does not wish to be disrespectful, a point of clarification is in order: the Directors would like me to note that the CEO and Chairman positions at USG, Inc. are distinct from yours, and that the executives are appointed by Globanque. The names of the incumbents are confidential, for reasons of optics and security. We doubt that the American people would understand why the two most powerful positions in what they mistakenly believe to be ‘their’ government are held by people whose names they have never heard of, and whose faces they have never seen. Perhaps in due course you can come meet your colleagues in Basel, and play a round of golf with them so you can get to know one another.

“If we were to portray USG, Inc. in geometric form, it would take the shape of a pyramid with a razor thin top and a very wide base. The base would represent the people, whom we ask to pay all the company’s bills. The middle would reflect the government staff who handle day-to-day logistics and the enforcement personnel who ensure the people don’t get out of line. And the top would represent the very few shareholders and cronies who control the corporation and make all the money. It is a fitting shape for USG, Inc., which happens to be the largest pyramid scheme civilization has ever known.

“In addition to being the largest corporation in the world, USG, Inc. is also the most profitable. You are looking at me quizzically, as if to say, “How can a corporation that is losing more than $1 trillion per year (as reflected by its deficits) be profitable? I’ll explain.

“While USG, Inc.’s deficits might look like losses, they actually represent dividends paid to its owners. Last year, the corporation had over $1,000,000,000,000 in deficits, which in fact were payments to Globanque and the other shareholders. The payments are made in many ways, including interest on the corporation’s massive debt; military contracts for contrived, enormously profitable wars; a broad variety of government contracts extended to cronies; so-called foreign aid which actually constitutes disguised payments to affiliates; and dozens of other ways to compensate insiders. USG, Inc. spends trillions of dollars each year, and no one really knows where all the money goes, even though the corporation does a good job of creating the impression that its accounting is accurate, which it is not.

“The deficits, in other words the shadow dividends funneled to shareholders, are funded by debt, which relentlessly rises at USG, Inc. The deficits and the debt increases move in unison. Dividends are extracted, and debt is injected. Forensic accountants would have a different term for this capital extraction; they would call it looting. Which is why forensic accountants are not permitted anywhere near USG, Inc.’s books. The corporation’s actions, just like those of the Fed and BIS, are completely immune from formal or actionable audit.

Over the past decade, more than $12 trillion dollars have been paid out by USG, Inc. in the form of dividends, making the shareholders extraordinarily wealthy. There has never been a dividend payout of this magnitude in commercial history. As you might imagine, Globanque spends a great deal of intellectual capital figuring out how to keep this trillion plus dollar game going. If USG, Inc. were to fail, it would be virtually impossible for Globanque to replicate it, and its earnings would be punished. Globanque’s Directors are not going to let that happen, if there is any way they can prevent it. If this means human casualties, so be it. They are people who do whatever it takes to win, with emphasis on the world whatever.

“There is a problem that concerns the Directors. There are unmistakable signs that the United States is approaching a state of what we call Peak Debt. While up until now we have had no problem saddling USG, Inc. with an ever expanding mountain of debt, and while we had planned on adding an additional $10 trillion of it during the next eight years or so, a faint but foul scent of debt revulsion seems to have seeped into the air.

“If we are not persistently able to increase USG, Inc.’s debt, it will become obvious that the company is bankrupt and that there is no viable means whatsoever by which to save it. USG, Inc. will have to be dissolved.

“The Peak Debt problem is compounded by the fact that in our view, the probability of a 2008/09-like financial crisis or worse occurring in the United States and beyond during the first two years of your presidency is close to 100%, which will hurt and possibly crush tax receipts. Therefore, there would be less money coming into USG, Inc. from taxes and debt issuance, a rabbit punch that would throw the corporation into a financial crisis.

“We have simulated in detail every possible response we might make when these problems manifest themselves. In the past, several temporary fixes were available to us, and we used them. But they were like bullets; they could only be shot once. Now, the ammunition box is empty, save for one remaining shell. Which is the outright confiscation of the people’s wealth in order to fund USG, Inc. and keep it alive; in other words, government bail-ins. We realize this measure is extreme and will be socially incendiary, but it is literally the only remaining option open to us next time around.

“The bad news for us, the dirty secret that must be kept a secret at any cost, is that as things stand right now, the people hold all the cards. The good news for us is that they don’t know it. If they were to understand and exert the financial power they possess, they could not only avoid the government bail-ins that are going to financially wound and ultimately impoverish them, but guarantee for themselves a level of financial freedom and personal well-being unmatched by anything they have ever before experienced. But they do not understand, at least not yet, and therefore they do not act. We need to keep it that way.

“The solution of which I speak is extraordinarily straightforward, and while it might sound simplistic, we at Globanque are almost certain it would work: for them, not us. All that the people need do is convert a portion of their digital fiat currency into precious metals. Now, while they still can. If they were to convert a mere 2% of their bank balances, roughly $200 billion, into gold, this would produce incremental demand of 167,000,000 ounces, assuming a price of $1,200 per troy ounce, which it won’t be for long. But incremental demand of that magnitude would obliterate supply, and prices would have to increase, possibly surge. This would convince many more people that it is a good idea to convert bank balances into real money. Which would lead to more buying, driving prices even higher. Ultimately, this could lead to a buying stampede, which is the exact last thing USG, Inc. and its fraudulent, exploitive banking system can withstand at this time. Such action by the people would deal a deadly blow to our strategy, which is to trap their money within the banking system, which we control, and keep it available for expropriation.

“We need to prevent the people from seeing the simple financial solution that is right before their eyes. It is vital that we keep them from moving their liquid assets outside of the banking system, either by withdrawing cash or purchasing precious metals. Accordingly, we have dramatically intensified actions designed to severely restrict or make it outright impossible for them to redenominate their liquid bank assets. The campaign is named “Operation No Exit,” and I will summarize some of its more important components.

“In Europe, we are radically expanding the definition of “cash” to include prepaid Visa, Eurocard, MasterCard and American Express cards, in addition to prepaid Merchant Gift Cards. Additionally, precious metals are being re-defined as cash. By including prepaid cards and precious metals under the “cash” umbrella, they will become subject to existing and soon to be broadly expanded controls. These cash equivalents will be confiscable on demand by authorities, with no probable cause other than suspicion of some kind of illegal activity or intent, which of course they can just invent.

“Prepaid cards present opportunity because we have rolled out and are perfecting a powerful technology known as ERAD: Electronic Recovery and Access to Data. ERAD devices enable us to swipe any prepaid card and determine its available balance. We can then instantaneously transfer that balance to the specific government bank account programmed into the ERAD terminal. The transfer is irreversible, so there is nothing the card holder can do about it.

“ERAD terminals also enable us to swipe bank-issued ATM, Visa Debit and MasterCard debit cards, determine the cardholder’s exact bank balance, and then seize that amount, in whole or in part. Banks’ daily withdrawal limits will not apply; they are superseded by ERAD. So we could instantaneously remove $100,000.00 from a cardholder’s bank account in one step, if the money were there. This is not a “future” technology, Mr. Trump; ERAD is already operational, and the technology improves every day. You can Google it, if you’d like.

“Several years ago, we expanded the Civil Asset Forfeiture program in the United States. This was a daring step, because CAF completely shreds the most basic and fundamental protections guaranteed by the Constitution. It is unique in that the victim, in other words, the person whose assets have been confiscated, is presumed guilty until they prove themselves innocent via an extremely complicated, specialized and costly legal process for which they themselves must pay. Which is often impossible for them to do, because in many if not most cases, the money they require to retain an attorney has been seized. Few attorneys will even touch a CAF case, due to its byzantine legal technicalities and hurdles, so those who will routinely charge $2,000 per hour or more. Most victims are therefore unable to legally fight for the recovery of the funds that have been stolen from them, resulting in a windfall for the seizing agencies. Which gives the agencies an increased incentive to further expand their CAF activities.

“We expected a strong backlash to CAF. But the fact is, there has been very little, other than from some of the victims. Certain courts have judged the method to be legal, which of course makes no Constitutional sense whatsoever. Those verdicts were only rendered because we paid or extorted judges hearing critical cases to legally ratify CAF. Given the unexpected success of CAF in the United States, we are rapidly expanding it throughout the west, particularly in Europe, where until now the practice has been illegal. CAF is a swift and efficient means by which to seize assets. It also enables us to zero in on specific targets, such as people we know to possess wealth.

“In 2013, we launched Operation Choke Point in the United States, a program that forced banks to summarily discontinue doing business with companies we wanted to cripple and shut down, including gun, ammunition and precious metals retailers. Unfortunately, the implementation of Operation Choke Point under Eric Holder was heavy-handed and sloppy, and it did generate some backlash. The Justice Department was forced to take a pause 18 months later, at least publicly. The program is still very much alive, and we are making the electronic processes more effective. Our objective is to be able to financially disconnect from the banking system and destroy any business that presents a threat to our agenda. If, for example, we cannot get gun control via the courts, then we can simply have the banking system impose it, by financially shutting down the dealers.

“In the United States, we have contracted with the Group of 30 to begin the process of demonizing and eliminating cash. Summers, Rogoff and Krugman are the principle spokespersons for this part of the campaign and we are paying them very well. They have all written articles, and Rogoff has written a book arguing that cash is a menace to society and that it should gradually be eliminated. They posit that drug dealers, terrorists and other undesirables use cash; therefore, it must be banned. There is literally no end to that kind of reasoning, which is exactly why we like to invoke it. By their logic, automobiles, gasoline and food should be prohibited, too, because drug dealers and terrorists drive cars and eat. The cash elimination campaign is based on Goebbels-style propaganda and demagoguery, but history proves that such techniques work, so we gladly use them even when the arguments are ridiculous. Currency elimination is a critical part of “Operation No Exit,” because it forces people to either spend their money, which produces tax revenue, or keep their money in banks, which are digital prisons that we guard and control, and that we intend to lock down when the time comes.

“The ECB is actively pursuing the cash elimination agenda in Europe. They have already stopped production of Euro 500 notes, and all existing Euro 500 notes are being segregated and destroyed if they are deposited into the banking system. Euro 200 and 100 notes will be eliminated next, then the 50s. Ultimately, there will be no cash in Europe. This goes for Australia and New Zealand, as well, where we are making gratifying progress. Control-freak bureaucrats are a Godsend to us.

“Sweden has actually stated its intention to be completely cashless within the next two years or so, which has been helpful to our agenda. We like to work with politicians and bureaucrats in smaller countries, because they can be bought off for less money than those in the bigger countries. We are having similar success in Uruguay, which is regarded as the “Switzerland of South America.” A lot of South American money finds refuge there, so it is an important country for us.

“Everyone knows about India by now. Modi was specifically instructed to conduct the Indian currency demonetization in a slow, methodical manner, as recommended in Rogoff’s book and as Draghi is doing it in Europe. Raghuram Rajan, former head of the Reserve Bank of India informed us that Modi was being pig-headed and would not listen. He wanted to be theatrical so as to look to the Indian people like a great crusader in a righteous cause. He is also a believer in the Politics of Envy, and told the phalanxes of poor Indians that he was rooting out the corrupt wealth of the rich. The hopeless love to hear that their oppressors are being taken down, even if what they hear is a lie. Rajan could not control Modi, so we airlifted him out of India and installed him at the BIS, as Vice Chairman. He will manage Indian recovery operations from there, and remains an important steersman for the overall agenda.

“By acting rashly and stupidly with his wholesale currency demonetization that has wreaked economic and personal havoc throughout India, Modi did severe damage to our cash elimination plans. His actions have provoked broad skepticism throughout the world about the risks of government-monopoly-controlled currencies and private, for-profit central banking systems. This has come at the exact wrong time. We need the people to have blind faith and confidence in fiat currencies and the banking system, because we need bank deposits to be at peak levels when we enact the government bail-ins. Time is already repairing the damage; it always does, as the memories of those struggling simply to survive are predictably short.

“Obama has immeasurably aided our cause by broadly expanding the provisions of the NDAA, which gives the U.S. government dictatorial powers over the people on any pretext whatsoever, even if the pretext is 100% fabricated to fit an agenda. If the American people actually took the time to read the NDAA, they would think they had been transported back in time to Stalinist Russia or Maoist China, but of course, they don’t take the time. They are too busy shopping, watching sports, gorging at all-you-can-eat buffets and texting mind-numbing gossip, which is exactly what we want them to do.

“We are rapidly introducing NDAA-like legislation throughout Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and parts of South America. When the crisis occurs, we will be able to lock down much of the world in a matter of a few hours. Far too little time for the people to be able to react or protect themselves in any effective manner. We have financial interests in and influence with most of these governments, so progress is swift.

“In that our remaining time has grown short, it is not possible for me to go into detail about companion initiatives such as FATCA, Fusion Centers, FinCen, new financial disclosure requirements in Greece that will soon to be extended throughout Europe, FBARS, data collection and sorting projects such as Echelon and Prism, or any of the literally hundreds of additional steps we are simultaneously taking to convert to a 100% digitized economy fully subject to our control. But I can assure you that these efforts are synchronized, global and highly effective.

“Let me just say that the true purpose of the NSA’s Utah Data Center is to create an electronic dossier on all American citizens, with a particular focus on their financial affairs. The UDC will know exactly what assets they own and where, their earnings from all sources, their spending patterns, their medical condition, the medicines they buy and take, the foods they eat, their hobbies and travel patterns, their addictions, the social networks they use and what they say on them, the emails they send and read, the Internet searches they conduct, the people they call and text, the people they see, and in particular, anything they do that compromises them and makes them susceptible to special forms of extortion and/or control. The slightly longer term objective is for the UDC to be able to predict people’s behavior. In this way, we can neutralize targets before we expect they might go into action in some inimical way.

“For us, the UDC’s most valuable innovation is the ability to financially turn people off, as if they were table lamps, should that be in our interests. By digitally decommissioning them, we can render them helpless in a world where all transactions must be made electronically, and cash no longer exists. Imagine if none of your payment cards worked, and there was no other way to make payments; if you could not buy gas or food, pay your utility bills, or eat in a restaurant; if your bank suddenly had no record of you whatsoever; if you had been completely erased from the digitized system that is the only means by which to function in society? In South America, they have a reputation for physically “disappearing” the undesirables; we are going to electronically disappear them, which will be far more efficient and deadly.

“We view it as highly unlikely that citizens will act out if they realize they can be turned off, like table lamps, not just for an hour or a day, but forever if we so choose. Now you exist; now you don’t. Poof! Gone! This will be a critical power for us to have during the government bail-ins; we will make it clear up front that anyone who opposes them will be turned off. And that we will not reactivate them. In time they will starve to death. So what?

“The UDC is being replicated throughout Europe, where significant wealth has accumulated over the centuries, which we plan to seize. The UK and Australia, too, are moving fast to deploy UDC technology in their countries. So there is much progress on many fronts.

“As you can see, this is a massive, multi-faceted, globally coordinated project. We estimate that within three years, the infrastructure for a completely digitized economy will be in place throughout the west. But during these three years, we are at extreme risk that the people will figure out what is happening, and take steps to resist it. Which would be very easy for them to do at this stage, as I pointed out earlier in my comments. We want their money, but at this point, they could easily remove it from our grasp. We are doing everything possible to keep them financially blind.

“The only reason we have been able to make the full-spectrum progress we have made, without any meaningful popular backlash is that the vast majority citizens don’t see the overall agenda. They read about one thing we’re doing in one area, another thing somewhere else, another thing in yet another place. But they are discrete data points and sightings. The people are too busy trying to survive to sit down, put all the puzzle pieces on the table, and then assemble them into the complete picture. If they did, they would be stunned and angry. And they would take action. But they don’t see the picture, they just see little fragments of it, so we are able to push on. When they finally do see it, our system will be in place and it will be too late for them to do anything about it.

“That summarizes where we are, but there’s one last thing. Our friends at Goldman are an important “boots on the ground” resource in for us here in the United States. We rely on them regularly. We do think you should bring Gary on board. Let him do his work from the inside. We will all be able to move a lot faster that way.

“Well, my time is up. It has been a pleasure speaking with you, Mr. Trump. I need to get back to Teterboro for the return flight to Switzerland; the Falcon and flight crew await. Next time we meet, I hope we won’t be so rushed, and that perhaps we can have a nice meal and let our conversation take us beyond business. There is more to life. With that, let me thank you again and bid you farewell for now.”

Ehrlich approaches the office door, then turns. “Something I almost forgot to mention. In the spirit of what they believe is going to become an excellent friendship, the Directors authorized me to share with you an inside tip, something they almost never do. They wanted you to know that they are buying gold in the millions of ounces. They think you should be buying, too. And particularly your children, whom they respect. It will be a home run for them, given the magic of time. Feel free to tell your kids to take a look at gold, but don’t tell them anything about our meeting. Your first loyalty test, my new friend.” He opens the door and is gone.

Trump turns to Cohn and says, “I guess the good Doctor’s just said ‘You’re Hired.’ I’ll get the process moving right away. And Good God, I had no idea all of this was going on.” The men shake hands and Cohn leaves the office.

[Seven days later, Donald Trump announced that Gary Cohn would become Director of the National Economic Council of the United States of America, one of the most powerful financial positions in the world.]

Stewart Dougherty is the creator of Inferential Analytics (IA), a forecasting method that applies to events proprietary, time-tested principles of human instinct, desire and action. In his view, forecasting methods not fundamentally based upon principles of human action are unlikely to be reliable over time. He is a graduate of Tufts University (BA) and Harvard Business School (MBA), is a 35+ year veteran of the business trenches and has developed IA over a period of 15+ years.

Goldman to Trump: Situation Assessment, Government Bail-ins, Precious Metals Threat: Systemic Collapse

Financial Markets, Gold, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, U.S. Economy, , , , ,

A guest post from Stewart Dougherty. Stewart included some thoughts in his email to me that I thought should be shared as a preface to his essay:

——————–

Hi Dave:
Some pretty heady stuff, particularly the part about the Fed’s balance sheet being a lie. (I am 100% convinced of this, but cannot prove it, at least not yet.) And remember, Bernanke was caught issuing $10 trillion in swaps to foreign banks, all of which was supposed to remain a complete secret. It is not as if they haven’t been caught doing what I am saying they are still doing, to an even larger degree.

I’ve stated that the “conversation” is imagined, intuited and fictional, so the small living parts of the shredded Constitution might actually protect my freedom of speech; wouldn’t that be amazing.

I believe “government bail-ins” is fresh terminology … people hear about bank bail-ins all the time … but they don’t hear about government bail-ins, which are going to affect far more people and are inevitable. (As I’ll explain in Part 2, government bail-ins are not going to be about taxes … tax increases are too slow, and oftentimes don’t even work.) Since it’s new, the term government bail-ins might gain a lot of attention.

——————–

Despite Goldman’s avid support for Hillary Clinton, fewer than three weeks after the election, Gary Cohn, the number two executive at Goldman Sachs met privately at Trump Tower with the President-elect. Ten days later, he was named to one of the most powerful financial positions in the world, Director of the National Economic Council of the United States of America.

As they say, knowledge is power, and power is knowledge; both open doors, ears and minds when they decide to. What could Cohn have said to Trump that resulted in his near-immediate hire? Using the Inferential Analytics methodology, we have synthesized a message a visitor of Cohn’s stature might have conveyed to Trump on November 29, 2016. And while it is inferred, intuited and fictional, the following transcript is deeply grounded in the nation’s current and prospective fiscal, financial, monetary and economic situation.

The Visitor: “I appreciate your invitation and it is a pleasure to meet with you today. Permit me to convey Lloyd’s congratulations. He would like to assure you that you have Goldman’s full support going forward.

“Our time is short, so I will give you a very high level situation assessment. Thousands of person hours and millions of dollars’ worth of research and analysis stand behind each of the themes I will touch on, and we can provide additional details if you wish. As one of the U.S. government’s closest financial allies for decades, particularly when it comes to the placement of the nation’s sovereign debt, we have a deep understanding of the financial dynamics at work. When I use the term “we,” it is because Goldman and the United States government have been close business partners for many years.

“As you correctly stated to the American people during your campaign, the situation is not good. It is containable at this time, but only if we continue to run substantial deficits and create large sums of new dollars, in other words, debt. With all due respect, we believe the U.S. government is going to need our help as never before in the coming months and years.

“I will briefly touch on nine topics. There are others we could discuss, but these tell the most important part of the tale. They are: 1) Deficits; 2) Debt; 3) Reporting; 4) War; 5) Perception; 6) Stocks; 7) Money Creation; 8) Currency; and, 9) Precious Metals.

“As you may know, I started my financial career as a Comex trader, and Lloyd began his as a gold dealer at J. Aron, which was acquired by Goldman. We both have extensive experience in the Precious Metals markets, and believe they are going to be of incalculable significance in the near future. I will review this topic later.

“All I ask is that you not shoot the messenger. Much of what I tell you is troubling.

“First, the deficits are structurally non-containable. The OMB itself confirms this, projecting escalating deficits for the next 50 years, with not one year of surplus during that entire time. The aggregate deficit during the next decade alone will be at least $10 trillion. If there is a slowdown or recession, it will be greater or even much greater. The deficits can only be reined by a massive political reset and wholesale reneging on the entire social contract, including Medicare, Social Security, public pensions and welfare. Such a reset would result in an economic collapse. Therefore, it is not feasible, although it could be forced upon us by endogenous or exogenous events that would take the situation out of our hands.

“The debt has gone vertical, rising from $10 to $20 trillion in eight years. Obama created more debt than all other presidents in the previous 230 years, combined. This amount does not include the federal government’s net, unfunded liabilities, which are an additional $150+ trillion, and growing by trillions per year on a GAAP accounting basis. Please understand that his shadow, unfunded debt is net of projected tax receipts; in other words, it is completely out of control.

“Debt is now increasing at an accelerating rate, with $1.4 trillion added last year alone. This debt can never be paid in future dollars having value anywhere even close to today’s, but for now at least, we are still able to peddle it. We do know that for us to successfully distribute the debt in the future, interest rates will have to go higher, which will compound the fundamental deficit and debt problems. Otherwise, we will have to print money on a scale never before seen, which will further damage the value of the dollar. There is a limit to how badly currencies can be damaged; they can and do go into freefall. Several are, as we speak.

“The so-called economic recovery has been false. The Obama administration, with the full support of the Fed created $10 trillion in counterfeit dollars and threw them at the economy, funding everything including non-stop wars, Food Stamps, a vast expansion of government, subsidized Obamacare, solar panel cronies, fund-raising and golf trips, you name it. It’s all included in the nation’s deliberately and, frankly, fraudulently inflated GDP. We understand; it had to be done, and we helped make it happen by being expert debt pushers.

“Some like to think that we can grow our way out of the deficits and debt, but our analysis disagrees. Assume 4% GDP growth. Given an $18 trillion economy (ours is not, as explained above, but let’s say it is), 4% growth means a GDP increase of $720 billion in Year 1. Let’s say the federal government is able to collect in taxes 25% of the gross GDP increase, a wildly optimistic assumption. That would produce $180 billion in incremental revenue. But the structural deficits, as reflected by the increases in debt, exceed $1 trillion per year. Even 4% GDP growth will hardly make a dent in the fiscal hemorrhaging. And to prime the pump for such growth, the government will have to spend a few hundred billion dollars per year on infrastructure spending and the like. This will fully negate the incremental taxes. So we have to dig a deeper fiscal hole for the privilege of digging an ever deeper fiscal hole.

“This leads to topic #3, Reporting. At this point, out of necessity, virtually every government economic statistic ranges from being “massaged” to outright false. GDP is particularly misleading. If we deducted government deficit spending and the multiplier effects it creates, the United States economy would immediately collapse. If that were to happen, we cannot credibly forecast a scenario that would restore it to growth. Economically, it would constitute an existential event.

“Obviously, we cannot openly admit the reality of the situation, or even let it become known. Therefore, the government must doctor the reports. Given the interrelationships among economic reports, we now have to lie about everything. If we just lied about certain metrics, say, GDP and employment, then the other metrics, if not similarly fabricated, would contradict the fabricated reports. We would be unable to explain the inconsistencies and contradictions. We have to lie about unemployment, GDP growth, retail sales, wages, money supply, the cost of Obamacare subsidies, current deficits, current debt, the true fiscal trajectory of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, government pension underfunding, projected deficits and debt, and all the rest. When it comes to false reporting, we’re in a box; there’s no alternative to it.

“This is one reason why the Alternative Media are so dangerous to us, and why we need to eliminate them. There are many talented analysts in that domain. They know the truth, and that we’re not telling it. The fact is that fake news comes from us, not them, as they are revealing to a growing army of citizens.

“In addition to false reporting, there is War. War is just like the Fed; it is never audited. This deliberate lack of oversight is how $6 trillion can go missing at the Army, alone. The Army’s missing funds are a small portion of the total amount that has disappeared into the military spending vortex. War spending is critical to topline GDP, and we can play a lot of non-detectible games with it. The saying, “War is the health of the state,” was coined for us. If we stopped fighting wars, GDP would crater. Wars are a necessary constant going forward, even if we have to invent them.

“This brings us to Perception, one of the most important factors of all. In reality, the economy and dollar have become a confidence game. We know that if confidence in an inherently dysfunctional system is lost, only a reset plus time can restore it. But as we discussed earlier, a reset is socially, politically and economically impossible. If the 200,000,000 U.S. citizens currently dependent upon the government to some degree were deprived of even a fraction of their payments, economic and social entropy would result. In fact, the people want more, not less. Free college; free or massively subsidized health care; a $15 minimum wage; the list goes on. Politicians have told them they can have these things, so there is a vast disconnect between popular expectations and fiscal reality.

“Stock market indices are one of the few tools we can use to create positive perceptions. We have successfully created a false perception of economic health by taking stocks to new highs. We have also deliberately engineered a “wealth effect,” which has artificially spurred spending and GDP, and boosted the so-called “animal spirits.” Doing these things has disguised reality and bought us a lot of time.

“But the real reasons we have manipulated stock markets higher go further. First, without a levitated stock market, the pension funds would collapse. Which would ripple through the economy in a massively destructive way.

“Second, federal, state and local governments need the capital gains-related tax revenue produced by the artificially propped-up stock markets. Dow 20,000 will produce a 2017 tax windfall, which is required to offset the damaged economy’s tax shortfalls. The stock markets are a crucial money machine when it comes to tax generation.

“Now to money creation, which takes us deep into the Dark Side. To fund the massive deficits and levitate the stock market, we have had to create trillions of new dollars. But if the actual amount were revealed, confidence in and the value of the dollar would collapse. So we have to lie about this, too. The Fed’s balance sheet is actually trillions more dollars than what is reported.

“We inject newly digitized currency into the system by crediting trusted, proven collaborators such as the BOE, BOJ and Bank of Israel with dollar amounts that can range into the trillions, depending upon circumstances. These collaborators use a portion of these credits to buy our stocks and bonds, in accordance with strict timing, allocation and dollar amount instructions. They funnel the remainder of the funds to trusted, third-party actors, including hedge funds, merchant banks and dark pool operators, providing them, too, with specific deployment instructions. Therefore, the buying comes from many different markets and locations, which makes it look normal and legitimate.

“What exists is a small club of trusted players who deploy enormous sums of money, all of it counterfeit and undocumented, to support the positive perception, healthy GDP and strong stock market agendas. This money costs our partners nothing; we create it for them, out of nothing. The fact is that management of the dollar is far more clandestine than any of the operations conducted by the CIA or NSA, and the Fed is the most secretive and sophisticated intelligence agency on earth. Geo-financial hegemony is its mission, and dollars are its spies, operating, misdirecting and deceiving from the shadows every minute of every day, all over the world.

“While a large and increasing number of citizens now demonstrate broad skepticism about government institutions, they still have blind faith in the statistics reported by the Fed. Which is upside down, because the Fed’s figures are the most dishonest of them all. It proves the power of propaganda, particularly when billions of dollars are spent on it. If the Fed were subject to audit, which of course it deliberately and necessarily is not, none of this would be possible. And if the true size, composition and deployment of the Fed’s balance sheet were known, the entire global financial system would implode.

“That is the situation, in a nutshell. As you can see, it is fragile and untenable. We can continue to manage it in the current context, but if the context were to change, even in small ways, it could all come down. We have to prevent that at any cost because if it does come down, even our most sophisticated computer simulations cannot posit a scenario by which it could be propped back up.

There is a subtle knock on the office door. Trump realizes he is out of time. He says to his guest, “I understand what you have said, and need you to come back and finish.” They arrange for the visitor to return in three days, December 2nd. Trump asks, “So we can move as fast as possible then, please give me a brief outline of what we will discuss.”

The visitor responds: “Most people do not think about these issues at all, but the sophisticated ones do. We have deliberately misdirected that cohort’s attention. We have distracted them with talk of bank bail-ins and other financial gossip to keep their thinking off of what is actually a much more profound and necessary outcome: government bail-ins. We have before us a complex, four dimensional puzzle, in which the puzzle pieces represent events wrapped in time. Both the controlling elite and the people are putting the puzzle pieces in place as fast as they can, because they know their futures depend on it. The side that first completes and comprehends the puzzle will win; the other side will lose. Two of the most important puzzle pieces are currency and precious metals, both swaddled in time. Which is running out for one side or the other.”

[To be continued in Part 2]

Stewart Dougherty is the creator of Inferential Analytics (IA), a forecasting method that applies to events proprietary, time-tested principles of human instinct, desire and action. In his view, forecasting methods not fundamentally based upon principles of human action are unlikely to be reliable over time. He is a graduate of Tufts University (BA) and Harvard Business School (MBA), is a 35+ year veteran of the business trenches and has developed IA over a period of 15+ years.

Guest Post: They Need To Destroy Gold/Silver To Destroy Our Freedom

Financial Markets, Gold, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, , ,

The past two days of ongoing metals oppression convinced me to write. This continuing government-conducted fraud and corruption is really getting irritating, and it tells an ominous tale.

Is it any wonder that we witness endless versions of “Extend and Pretend”? That we witness endless strangulation of the truth, such as is represented by free metals prices? That the nation is drowning in propaganda and lies so thick they could double the mass of our oceans?

They are going to keep this fraud going as long as they can, because every single day represents $2,800,000,000.00 in looted profits. The Middle Class has no idea what has been done to it. This is what has been done to it.

I believe that Yellen went to the White House to inform Obama and team that the Fed is witnessing a quiet, steady bank run taking place in the U.S. The Fed is worried about the fact that the people are apparently starting to figure out how totally corrupt the monetary and financial systems have become, and are now taking action to financially protect themselves.

The Fed is seeing bank balances being exchanged for cash and metals. Trotting out Summers and Draghi to demonize cash ($100s and Euro 500s) backfired; savvy people said to themselves, “If the government, banker shills (e.g., Summers; Peter Sands (author of the Harvard “ban cash” paper; etc.) and bankers are saying “A,” the truth must be “Z,” and we better get some of our money out of the banks, before the bail-ins that have been legalized and formalized are actually implemented.”

The establishment desperately needs to go to a cashless system, in order to effect the bail-in agenda, gain full-spectrum control over financial assets, and implement the IMF-proposed wealth tax, among other gambits, but they need more time to implement this. They must get non-cash payment devices into the hands of every citizen before going live with the cashless regime, but they are not there yet. However, their progress to date has been prodigious.

For example, most welfare benefits (e.g., Food Stamps, etc.) are now electronic, via EBT cards. And Social Security recipients must have bank accounts for direct deposits (to which a Debit Card can be appended); if they don’t, then receive their benefits via a “Treasury Direct” Master Card debit card. In just these two above categories, more than 110,000,000 people now have electronic payment cards. Add to this at least another 160,000,000 “banked” citizens, and as we can see, they are moving swiftly toward the goal of universal electronic payment capability among the populace. The infrastructure is largely in place, and progress from here will accelerate.

The day after the Yellen/Obama/Biden meeting, metals were slammed. Yes, this happens on a regular basis, but the timing was interesting nonetheless.

As we all know, over the past several days there has been a spate of stories about how counterfeit precious metals coins are “flooding the market.” These stories admonish citizens not to “waste their money” on “worthless” counterfeit coins, and make it sound as if the average citizen could never in a million years figure out how to distinguish a counterfeit coin from a genuine one. Message: Precious metals are extremely dangerous and you should keep your money in the bank, where it is safe.

Given that the vast preponderance of American citizens have never even touched a gold coin, let alone owned one, the propagandists are feeding on ignorance and naivete. It is easy to scare people away from something they know nothing about, and fear might hurt them. Just look at the Mark Dice video where he offers poor, clueless, “Everyman” citizens a choice between a free chocolate bar or a free 10 ounce silver bar: they literally recoil from the silver, as if it might attack them.

This kind of propaganda is just one part of the overall campaign to demonize metals and attempt to counteract the slow bleed of money out of the banks. We know for a fact that physical metals sales are at all time highs, both here and internationally. Bank cash withdrawal data is much harder for “outsiders” to obtain, but the banks, the Fed and the Treasury see this information instantaneously. Cash withdrawal data are the absolute last thing banks want people to have visibility into, because bank runs are, first and foremost, psychological phenomena.

Aware citizens have seen numerous news stories by now about bail-ins, and have also registered what the Cypriots and Greeks have endured. No rational person wants that kind of theft to occur to them, so the obvious human reaction is to go get some money from one’s bank account … particularly given that one’s funds now earn nothing sitting in the bank and given that the law is now crystal clear that depositors are subordinated creditors who will be the last people in line to see their own money, if any of it still exists after the banks are done helping themselves to it during a bail-in event.

Some people might object by saying, “The average person has no idea about bank bail ins,” but we’re not talking about the average person. The statistics are clear that the average person doesn’t have any money any longer, so they won’t care about something that bears no relationship to them, such as bail-ins. Recent estimates are that 65% of the people don’t have a spare $1,000 at this time. What we are talking about are the people who do have some money, and such people are likely to be aware of and sensitive to what is happening with bail-in legislation, Greece, Cyprus, Wall Street corruption, the theft of their savings, and the like. They weren’t able to save money by being financially stupid.

I could give you many more data points, but they all tell the same story. Money is on the move, out of the banks. The Fed and Treasury are extremely concerned about this, and are doing everything they can to stem the tide. They fully intend to expropriate a portion of this money, just to keep the government’s lights burning (the IMF Wealth Tax is not some theoretical notion; it is a plan), so they cannot allow it to get loose. The recent escalation in metals oppression is no surprise.

(By the way, I specialize in a research technique called Inferential Analytics. It is a very rigorous and accurate predictive technique that is based upon fundamental principles relating to Human Action, and something I have developed over many years. I use it in my private work, but someday might take it mainstream. The forecasts generated by Inferential Analytics at this time are beyond sobering, and that’s putting it mildly.)

One other thing: The Fed and Treasury have detailed visibility into funds flows (wires, checks, credit card transactions, etc.) to metals wholesalers (e.g., Apmex, CNT, and all the other Mint-authorized distributors), and downstream from there to the leading national retailers such as Monex, etc. (PM ads by such national retailers run all day long on media outlets like Fox. The retailers are clearly succeeding; if they were not, they would pull their ads. But we see the opposite: an increase in these ads). Additionally, the monetary authorities have direct visibility into eBay’s PM sales, which are significant. They are looking at these data and realizing there is a serious problem of money “disappearing” into metals, their worst nightmare, and into cash, their second worst nightmare.

It is likely that the anti-PM propaganda is going to intensify, and people will need to understand why it is happening in order to withstand and repel it. If there is no successful rebuttal of the propaganda, then the establishment will progressively poison the people’s minds about PMs, as a precursor to using some kind of pretext to prohibit its private ownership altogether, once again. So I do believe that this is an important matter, because we are looking at a full-scale effort to destroy one of the last and most fundamental bastions of freedom, financial freedom. If the people do not understand why metals are constantly demonized by the establishment, or the purpose of the ongoing price oppression, then they will fail to understand the importance of this battle, and how absolutely vital to their overall, and not just financial freedom the ability to own metals is to them.

Stewart Dougherty: I am a Harvard MBA, and Inferential Analytics leverages quantitative and qualitative techniques that I learned both in my education, and during a 30+ year business career. I am semi-retired, but have never worked harder in my life. About six years ago, I wrote several articles that were picked up by 24hgold, MarketOracle, Lew Rockwell, Goldseek and numerous other Internet publishers followed even by some magazines.

SoT Ep 34 – Claudio Grass: Gold, Greece And The War On Cash

Financial Markets, Gold, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, , , ,

There is a trend, we can see a clear opposition is growing, we have more people moving toward our point of view than the Statists’ views. At the end of the day, how much worse does it need to become until the people finally realize that they are completely enslaved.  – Claudio Grass, Shadow of Truth

Claudio Grass is a Managing Director of Global Gold, a bullion company specializing in storage of physical precious metals outside the banking system in safe jurisdictions like Switzerland.  As an advocate of free-market thinking and libertarian political philosophy, Claudio is adherent of the Austrian School of Economics.

The backbone even for our current monetary system is gold – that’s why most
of the Central Banks are still acquiring physical gold.  – Claudio Grass on Shadow of Truth

Whether or not Greece defaults on its debt and leaves the EU is at the top of the news nearly everyday.  Rory disagrees with me,  but from my point of view the ECB will, at the end of the day, ensure that Greece does not default and remains in the EU.  Claudio agrees with me, but sees it more as a function of the west’s move to implement more centralized control of the western economic, financial and political systems.  Letting Greece go would undermine this effort.

The longer I think about it, the more doubt I have [that Greece leaves the EU].  What they really want to do is centralize the system even more…Greece will stay in the eurozone and it might be used as a test case for banning cash.  – Claudio Grass

The latter suggestion is something that makes a lot of sense, especially when we consider that Cyprus was used as test model for bail-ins.

There several more hidden gems of insight and wisdom in our conversation with Claudio which make this podcast well-worth the time spent listening:

If they ban cash they will have the possibility to track everyone to see that they’re doing with their money and then they can implement negative interest rates

The Death Of Cash Approaches

Financial Markets, U.S. Economy, , , ,

The Orwellian media apparatus is now beginning the prep the sheeple for the eventual elimination of cash for our system and a move to a digital electronic currency system.  Of course, this will give the Government and bankers even more control over your life and will make it easier to implement bail-ins.

A reader commented today:

And so it starts. On the local news at noon there was a segment on how money is filthy and can make you physically sick. They talked about e-coli and had slides and Petri dishes covered with bacteria in full bloom. The message was plain.  Money is dirty and for the sake of the children should not be used.  I expect we will see much more of this in the near future before cash is outlawed but it’s for our own good – don’t you know that?   Of course this will only be done because government is so very concerned about our welfare.

one-dollar-bill-largeThe path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you.  – Quentin Tarantino

EU Regulators Order 11 Countries To Adopt Bail-In Rules

Financial Markets, Gold, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, U.S. Economy, , ,

If there is a risk in a bank, our first question should be:  “Ok, what are you the bank going to do about that? What can you do to recapitalise yourself?”  If the bank can’t do it, then we’ll talk to the shareholders and the bondholders. We’ll ask them to contribute in recapitalising the bank.  And if necessary the uninsured deposit holders:  “What can you do in order to save your own banks?” – Jeroen Dijsselbloem, President of the Board of Directors of the European Stability Mechanism,  March 26, 2013

The bail-ins are coming.  Reuters reported today that European Commission today gave France, Italy and nine other EU countries two months to adopt bank bail-in regulations or face legal action – LINK

The move to require bank bail-ins originated at the BIS – Bank for International Settlements beginning in 2008.   In 2011, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) – a sub-committee of the BIS – drafted the boilerplate model for big bank bail-ins:  Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes for Financial Institutions.

The objective of an effective resolution regime is to make feasible the resolution of financial institutions without severe systemic disruption and without exposing taxpayers to loss, while protecting vital economic functions through mechanisms which make it possible for shareholders and unsecured and uninsured creditors to absorb losses in a manner that respects the hierarchy of claims in liquidation.

The bank rescue model as drafted lays out a complete systematic procedure for the rescuing and restructuring of any financial institution considered “SIFI” – a Systematically Important Financial Institution.  In layman terms this translates into “Too Big To Fail.” This model was endorsed by the G20 at Summit in 2011.

The “model” requires that funds required for a bail-in to prevent a TBTF from collapsing would first be taken from unsecured creditors.  This is primarily any depositor money in excess of the amount insured by the Government.  Incredibly, and this has been ratified by legislation in the United States, holders of derivative securities of the collapsing bank are considered super-secured.  In other words, those stakeholders in the banks would be the last to suffer any losses resulting from the restructuring of an insolvent bank.

In the United States there is over $4 trillion in depositor cash in excess of the amount covered by the FDIC sitting in banks.

Make no mistake about this, bail-in legislation is coming to the U.S.  In fact, a $1.1 trillion spending Bill passed by Congress and signed by Obama on December 16, 2014 contained specific provisions drafted (and paid for) by Citibank which ensured that big bank OTC derivatives holdings will be covered by the FDIC (i.e. taxpayer).  This is a back-door way of making the next taxpayer bailout of the big banks a legal requirement.

Anyone who keeps any cash in a bank is either completely ignorant of the ways in which that money can be “confiscated” or just completely brain-dead.  I suppose there could be a strong element of denial involved as well.  Big bank balance sheets are in far worse shape than they were in 2008, especially once you peel away all of the accounting shenanigans and include the off-balance-sheet ticking bombs.   It’s not a question of “IF” – It’s a question of “WHEN.”

We can ignore reality, but we cannot ignore consequences of ignoring reality.  – Ayn Rand

How Derivatives Will Trigger A Bond Market Melt-Down (Part 1)

Financial Markets, Market Manipulation, Precious Metals, U.S. Economy, , , ,

Get your money out of the bond market.  Once the default-contagion starts, it will spread faster than the bubonic plague which caused the Black Death in the 14th century.  I just got off the phone this morning with a source in NYC who confirmed that several Wall Streeters he knows all believe a far bigger “Long Term Capital” collapse triggered by derivatives defaults could occur at any time:

Long Term Capital, for those of you who are unaware, was the infamous hedge fund run by an ex-Salomon Brothers bond “guru.” He assembled a Dream Team of Nobel Prize Winning professors who claimed to have figured out how to produce “alpha” (excess returns) without any “beta” (systematic risk). One of the professors was Merton Miller. I was at the University of Chicago when Miller received his Nobel Prize. We bought his snake-oil hook, line and sinker. So did the large pension funds and wealthy investors who threw their money a Long Term Capital.

To cut to the chase, it didn’t take too long before LTCM imploded. I guess the Nobel “Dream Team” had not figure out how to turn lead into gold after all. LTCM was bailed out by the Fed plus several of the big Wall Street banks who also faced collapse if LTCM was allowed to incinerate to the ground. These banks had all plugged LTCM with the derivatives trades that blew up LTCM. I was at one of them, Bankers Trust, which was one of the guiltiest perpetrators and which had been found guilty several years of earlier of ripping off Proctor and Gamble with derivatives.  Bankers Trust is now part of Deutsche Bank, one of the two most risky banks in the world (JP Morgan is the other).

Back then it was the Wall Street banks who were required to put up “equity” to keep their businesses alive. In 2008 it was the Taxpayers and the “equity” put up  by Taxpayers was 8x greater. Only that equity went into the pockets of the people running the banks.

Don’t let your “equity” sitting mutual funds and money market funds get taken from you in the next stage of bailouts, which will be the nefarious “bail-ins.” “Bail-in” means your money that will taken from your pocket and given to the entities who face collapse.