Tag Archives: fake news

Bank Loans Take A Dive: It’s The Economy, Stupid

Financial Markets, Housing Market, Market Manipulation, U.S. Economy, , , ,

I am compelled to correct a report posted on Zerohedge about the cliff-dive going on in commercial, industrial and consumer loans. The report in ZH suggested the plunge is connected to two possibilities: 1) this one from a Wall Street sleazebag from Barclays: “it is possible that companies have shifted from the loan to the bond market, and are selling more bonds to lock in cheap financing before rates rise, while not encumbering assets with issuing unsecured debt;” and 2) political uncertainty connected to Trump.

The first possibility could have some small amount of legitimacy except that if you parse through all the data available at the Fed, you’ll see that bank credit has plunged across the entire spectrum of U.S. business (I used size of loan as the proxy). Smaller businesses do not have access to public credit markets and thus the first explanation is the typical apology for a negative economic report that we would expect from a Wall Street con-artist. Furthermore, some people are forgetting that this decline of bank loans could be down to the fact that there are now more options for people to get loans. More people are looking into loans like the smaller Auto Title Loans as a way to get quick money rather than look to the banks for help. This is happening all over the world, with Swedens using snabblån utan UC to help when they are looking for some quick cash and others using payday lenders. The second possibility is part of the anti-Trump narrative found in the fake news reports coming from the ignorant.

“It’s The Economy, Stupid”

That quote was created by James Carville as one of Bill Clinton’s campaign slogans in 1992. Those words ring even truer today. A primary example is the restaurant industry numbers discussed above. “Hope” and “confidence” do not generate economic activity. And “hope” is not a valid investment strategy. A better guide to what’s happening to economic activity on Main Street is to see what banks are doing with their lending capital. I borrowed the two graphs below from the @DonDraperClone Twitter feed (click to enlarge):

Commercial bank lending is a great barometer of economic activity. The top graph above shows the year over year percentage change in commercial and industrial loans for all commercial banks. You can see that the rate of bank lending to businesses is falling doing a cliff-dive. These are primarily senior secured and revolving credit loans that sit at the top of the capital structure. If bank lending is slowing down like this, it means two things: 1) the ability of businesses to repay new loans is declining and 2) the asset values used to secure new loans will likely decline. Most companies now are opting for small loans with loan companies and not banks, such as https://xn--sm-ln-nrac.com/. In fact, it is highly probable that the tightening of credit by the banks is a directive from the Fed. Yes, the Fed. Despite its public commentary suggesting otherwise, the Fed knows as well as anyone that the economy is tanking. This is why the Fed can’t hike rates up to a level that would bring real interest rates up to at a “neutral” level (using a real price inflation measure, Fed Funds needs to be reset to at least 6%, and likely higher, to get the real rate of interest up to zero).

The only reason the Fed might “nudge” interest rates higher next week is for credibility purposes. Everyone knows inflation is escalating, which makes it difficult for the Fed to keep interest rates so close to zero. In addition, a rate hike now, even though it will be insignificant in magnitude, will give the Fed room to take rates back to zero when the public and Congress begin to scream about economy.

The second graph shows the year over year percentage change in auto loans. The implications there are fairly self-explanatory. Auto sales are slowing down because the “universe” of potential prime and subprime rated car buyers, new and used cars, has been largely exhausted. In fact, with the default rate on subprime auto loans beginning to hit double-digits, the next phase in the automobile credit market will likely be credit implosion crisis.

The above commentary was an excerpt from the latest issue of the Short Seller’s Journal.

ADP’s Job “Creation” Report Is A Fraud

Financial Markets, Housing Market, Market Manipulation, U.S. Economy, ,

Put it on CNN and it’s “true.” Americans will turn on their tv’s and open their newspapers tomorrow (the small percentage that still read newspapers) to hear and read that the U.S. economy “created” nearly 300,000 jobs in February – at least according to ADP. .

The easiest way to hold ADP accountable and eviscerate the credibility of their report is to examine their “methodology.” Of course, this requires searching the ADP website to find the area way at the bottom where it describes its “methodology,” something no fake news reporter or analyst has to time with which to bother.

As ADP describes in its “methodology” section, it seeks to “closely align” the final output of its calculations with that of the “final print of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) numbers.” Thus, ADP’s “job creation” report is really nothing more than a regurgitation of the fraudulent employment report issued by the U.S. Government.

Here’s the other variables of input that the new ADP methodology now incorporates into its methodology used in ADP’s “enhanced ADP National Employment Report”

  • ADP matched-pair growth rates by industry
  • Lagged values of BLS estimates of growth of employment by industry with industry specific restrictions
  • Unemployment Insurance Claims (UNI_US)
  • Oil Prices
  • The Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index (CSENT_US)
  • The Composite Index of Leading Indicators (LEAD_US)

The “soft” data reports above have nothing do with job creation. Unemployment claims are historically low because the labor force participation rate is historically low, which means that the number of people who are terminated and can file for nemployment benefits is historically low. How is this variable an input on job creation?

WELCOME TO ADP’S RABBIT HOLE

Since when did the manipulated price direction of oil create jobs? Consumer confidence creates jobs? Please. In fact, ALL of the variables listed above and used by ADP in formulating its job creation report are highly manipulated and in no way represent the process by which jobs are created – other than the growth in propaganda creation positions at the Government and at the mainstream media outlets.

But there’s more. ADP claims that 106,000 jobs were created in February in the “goods producing sector.” The primary goods producing sector in the U.S. is the auto industry, which is currently cutting jobs in order to cut production in the face of record auto inventory sitting on dealer lots. In fact, GM announced 1,100 job cuts at one of its production facilities yesterday.

ADP also claims that 66,000 jobs were “created” in construction. But we know based on the Government’s construction spending report that the Government alone cut construction spending by nearly 8% last month. Most major cities around the U.S. now have years of apartment inventory. For instance, San Francisco now has 5 years of vacant supply: LINK. Commercial real estate occupancy rates are soaring with the number of retailers filing bankruptcy and closing stores. At least 7 major retailers this year have filed chapter 11 or are in the process of trying to restructure debt. This is a major source of job loss and it’s simply not credible that commercial construction is on the rise, which means that the 66,000 “new” jobs attributed to construction is a complete fraud.

Leisure and hospitality is credited with producing 40,000 new jobs in February. I’d love to sit down with the ADP analyst to find out where this number came from. The restaurant industry experienced revenue declines nearly every month in 2016. Same-store-sales and foot traffic plunged across the industry. It’s inconceivable that the leisure and hospitality industry produced this many jobs, if any at all, given the underlying fundamental condition of the median average household, which has been experiencing declining real disposable income for several years now

The report also gives credit to small businesses for “creating” 104,000 jobs. This is not even remotely credible. A report out just a couple months ago stated that the creation of new businesses in the U.S. is at a 40-year low: LINK. Does anyone really believe that Trump’s “hopium” effect suddenly inspired a rush to start new businesses which then hired 104,000 people? Why are many unemployed Americans frequently using something like this clean, simple template for their resumes in hopes of standing out within this job market, if these numbers are legitimate?

There’s several more inconsistencies in ADP’s report. I’ll leave it to the reader to sort through the actual report itself and decide what’s real and what’s fraudulent. As far as I can tell, the ADP report has been designed to piggy-back and “confirm” the fraudulent employment issued by the Government every month.

 

Big Brother In America Is The Media

Financial Markets, Housing Market, Market Manipulation, U.S. Economy, , ,

Journalism and a free, open media is another “check and balance on the three branches of Government and we don’t have that check and balance anymore.” – Shadow of Truth

One of the hallmarks of a totalitarian political regime is control of the media. In 1996 president Bill Clinton signed into law the Telecommunications Act of 1996. This law, which was bought and paid for by corporate media lobbies, allowed big corporations to acquire and consolidate media outlets nationwide.

The 1996 law lifted the limit on the number of television and radio stations any one corporation could own. In 2003, the FCC voted to lift the ban on cross-ownership of newspapers and full-power broadcast stations that serviced the same community. This was the final nail in the coffin of free and competitive media and news-reporting in the U.S.

The 1996 Clinton law followed by the lifting of the cross-ownership ban enabled Corporate America to increase their monopoly on the flow of information in the U.S. and around the world. Now six corporations control well over 90% of all media in the U.S.: NewsCorp, Disney, Viacom, Time Warner, CBS and Comcast.

“Wall Street slips on and geopolitical worries” (Reuters headline).   What does the Trump/Obama wiretapping squabble have to do with whether the stock market goes up or down? It has nothing to do with whether or not corporations can produce goods and services profitably. Too be sure the accusation of wiretapping and the possibility that the accusation is accurate is troublesome in and of itself.  But it has nothing to do with the fact that the stock market is currently the most overvalued in U.S. history.

The headlines, however  reflect the degree to which all media reporting in the U.S. is now under the control of Corporate America – a Corporate America that has assumed control of the political process and has become Orwell’s  Big Brother .

Most people associate the term “fascism” with an authoritarian and nationalistic political system. But it’s much more than that. Mussolini described “fascism” as the merger between Corporations and Government. The political system in the U.S. can easily be considered “fascist,” as Corporate America and Wall Street have used billions of dollars to take over the entire political process including all of the mainstream outlets of communication and news reporting.

The result is directly reflected in the nature of the 2016 presidential and congressional elections. The content of any news reporting is now a product of the material fed through the broadcast and print communication outlets controlled by six corporate monoliths and the Too Big To Fail banks that finance the system.

A good friend and colleague of the Shadow of Truth, John Titus, once quipped with regard to the public’s consumption and acceptance of anything reported as news, “put it on CNN and it’s true.” This statement succinctly summarizes the propaganda which supports the process by which the Government seeks to control the views and perceptions of the public at large.  In today’s Shadow of Truth podcast, we toss around that fact that the United States has become a Goebellsian “playground” and George Orwell’s nightmare:

Chris Martenson: The Mother Of All Bubbles

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

The Daily Coin sat down with Chris Martenson to discuss the hijacking of the system by the wealthy insider elites and the banks:

The system is rigged against each of us. If you are not a member of the “big club” then you, like myself, have to live with the fact that we are nothing more than an ATM for the uber wealthy. We supply all their toys, entertainment and wealth. The sad part is, we do it willingly.

Here’s how bad it is. You wanna know how bad this is? They don’t even care about optics any more. JP Morgan yesterday announced for the last four years they have only experienced two days of trading loses. There’s about 200 trading days a year. So, out of 800 days only 2 days were loses, but 2016 that number was zero. No day loses and their average take, “from trading the markets” was $80 MILLION a day. Chris Martenson, The Daily Coin

On Thursday March 2 silver was monkey-hammered to the tune of more than a 4% drop in under an hour. There was more than $2 BILLION of digital contracts dropped on the “market” during this time to achieve this massive drop. Gold was, to a degree, spared and only suffered about a 2% drop. Silver was the focus of the bullion banking cartel.

Here’s the thing. These criminal banksters do NOTHING to produce wealth. Their job is stealing. If you or I were to commit a crime, like market rigging, we would be in federal prison on several felony charges, including conspiracy, and would be treated like the criminal we are. The banksters, on the other hand, are treated like royalty for committing the same crime on a global scale. Their crimes should actually be considered crimes against humanity as these crimes impact millions upon millions of people.

The Deep State’s Message: Prepare For Totalitarianism

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

I find the current political situation to be as bad as I thought it would be when I forecasted it about ten years ago. The worst is yet to come. The corruption in the system is becoming much more apparent. The extreme biases in the mainstream media in favor of their particular owner’s faction is fairly obvious…The moneyed class turned the law and the thought leaders framing to their own benefit, and would now do anything they can to keep their ill-gotten gains. – “Jesse,” from Jesse’s Cafe Americain

Were you aware that the Government is starting to implement eye-scanners as part of the airport security protocol?  If you doubt that, then read this:  U.S. Marshals Scanned My Retina.   The TSA circus is all for show. It’s a way for the Government to get us used to following its orders and a way for the manufacturers of the technology used to make billions from selling that technology to the Government.   It also is an excuse for the Government to create employment for those who lack the competency to find a job in the private sector.

Ben Franklin said, to paraphrase, those who are willing to give up some freedom in exchange for security will end up with neither.  That’s where we are today, America.  The Patriot Act was written well over a year before 9/11.   The blueprint for the Department of Homeland Security was crafted in the mid-1990’s, during Clinton’s presidency.

It’s all stunningly Orwellian.  Even the terms used to describe newly created Government functions are right out of “Animal Farm” and “1984.”  The totalitarian control, confiscation of wealth by those in a position to confiscate and the use of technology to invade and regulate our private lives was prophesied by Orwell, Ayn Rand (“Atlas Shrugged”) and Aldous Huxley (“Brave New World”).    The technology that we take for granted as making our lives better is being used to remove our rights and freedoms.

Ironically, it all starts with the control of  the monetary system.  Those who control a nation’s currency need not be concerned about who or what makes the laws (Mayer Rothschild).   A few unelected “officials” control the United States’ creation of currency, which is then used as a tool to confiscate wealth – at first slowly and soon it will happen all at once.

In today’s episode of the Shadow of Truth, we discuss the Orwellian fog that is enveloping the nation and connect the political control our lives to the control of interest rates and gold:

Alan Greenspan Endorses The Gold Standard

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

In his remarkable essay, “Gold and Economic Freedom,” written in 1966, Alan Greenspan stated:

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. But government bonds are not backed by tangible wealth, only by the government’s promise to pay out of future tax revenues, and cannot easily be absorbed by the financial markets. A large volume of new government bonds can be sold to the public only at progressively higher interest rates. Thus, government deficit spending under a gold standard is severely limited. 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.

Greenspan of course went to become the front-man for the interminably corrupted Central Bank system, which is utilized as a wealth-confiscation and control mechanism for the elitists who control western Governments (Mayer Rotschild: “let me issue and control a nation’s currency and I care not who writes the laws”).

Interestingly, Greenspan is spending his final years coming clean about fiat currencies and the fractional banking system, as reviewed here in The Daily Coin:  LINK.   Most recently, in an interview with the World Gold Council’s “Gold Investor” publication, Greenspan fully endorses a return to the gold standard:

If the gold standard were in place today we would not have reached the situation in which we now find ourselves. We cannot afford to spend on infrastructure in the way that we should. The US sorely needs it, and it would pay for itself eventually in the form of a better economic environment (infrastructure)  LINK

We can only speculate the reasons why Greenspan has gone full circle back to his views expressed in his 1966 seminal essay about gold and is “coming clean” about economic systems based on fiat currencies rather than a gold standard.  But the fact that the former fiat money “Maestro” is now advocating the gold standard reinforces its validity.

In today’s episode of the Shadow of Truth,  we discuss the effort underway to discredit gold by the mainstream media using misinformation, disinformation and outright lies in the context of Greenspan’s stunning admissions:

Click on either image to learn more:

Fake Economic News + Overvalued Stocks = Recipe For Market Disaster

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

Think you know what will happen this year?  What would you have said to me on January 1st last year if I told you:  ” the S&P 500 would hit several new all-time years this year and Donald Trump will be elected President?”

Craig “Turd Ferguson” Hemke invited me on to his “A2A” webinar with his subscribers last week.  We had a spirited and (I think) entertaining discussion about abundance of fake economic news that permeates the financial media, the true state of the U.S. economy and the growing risks to the stock market.  And of course we chatted about precious metals an mining stocks.

And of course his subscribers had some interesting and thought-provoking questions. You can listen to our conversation here:  A2A with Dave Kranzler and you can access Turd’s webite here:  TFMetals Report.

Trump Fiddles While The United States Burns

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

If history is any guide, global changes of this magnitude mean that the entrenched systems run by central banks and Deep State politics are set to be destabilized on a level we may have not witnessed in our lifetimes, which means assets like bitcoin, gold, and silver could become the safe havens of choice for investors.  – Mac Slavo, SHTFplan.com

Mac’s comment above was in response to the news that First Majestic CEO, Keith Neumeyer, is prepared to join the legal battle being waged against the world’s largest banks for manipulating the gold and silver markets.   Good luck with that.

But even if the plaintiffs make some headway against the banks, this fight will take years to wage and it will likely do little more than provide some temporary relief from the financial market’s equivalent of pancreas cancer.

While the precious metals community engaged in a celebratory end-zone dance when Deutsche Bank admitted to malfeasance in its paper silver trading business, the insolvent bank coughed up a fine that was mere pittance of the billions it made over the years rigging the LBMA.

To make matters worse, JP Morgan was mentioned nowhere in Deutsche’s testimony.   JP Morgan has by far the largest silver vault on the Comex, with an alleged 82 million ozs in its custody.  The next largest is Brinks with 25 million.  I say “alleged” because it’s quite doubtful that a large portion of JPM’s reported holdings exists anywhere other than as an entry on its daily vault report.  Ask Germany about that…

JPM also happens to be the largest market maker in Comex silver futures, it’s part of the bank cartel that fixes the price of silver on the LBMA everyday and it’s the vault custodian of the alleged silver that is supposed to belong to the SLV trust.   Does it make sense that JP Morgan went unnamed in the Deutsche Bank confessional?   If that happens to pass your smell test then we would suggest that you blow your nose thoroughly and take another sniff.

With regard to the manipulation of precious metals, if you want to kill a snake, you have to cut off its head. Similarly, if you want to end precious metals manipulation, you need to destroy the BIS.  The directive and authority to manipulate the metals comes from the mother of all Central Banks.  JP Morgan is the BIS’ chief agent in executing the directive. Deutsche Bank was given explicit instructions to omit all references to JP Morgan from its superficial mea culpa.

Mac is correct in his assertion that systems run by Central Banks are becoming destabilized.  And he is correct in his implied assertion that this will lead to much higher precious metals prices.  Bitcoin?  Who knows?  Bitcoin is a de facto digital currency and thus yet another fictitious form of money with a computer system as its counterparty.

The problem is that as the destabilization process unfolds, the Establishment will fight back hard in an effort to maintain control.   This blow-back will be in the form of a further advancement toward Governmental totalitarianism. With the geopolitical and economic wheels beginning to fly off rails, at this point it’s fait accompli.    In today’s episode of the Shadow of Truth, we discuss the general systemic decay of the U.S. and Trump’s role as the modern day Nero:

Fake News Alert: Existing Home Sales Report

Financial Markets, Housing Market, Market Manipulation, U.S. Economy, , ,

I’m going to have to throw a flag on the existing home sales report for November published today by the National Association of Realtors.    The NAR would have us believe that home sales occurred in November at 5.6mm annualized rate for the month, up 15.4% from November 2015 and up .7% from October.   I will point out that, of course, the orignal report for October was revised lower.  But who pays attention to those details?

Take a look at this graphic sourced from Zerohedge which shows existing home sales plotted vs mortgage applications back to 2013:

I hate to be cynical, or accuse anyone of presenting “fake news,” but the mortgage application data completely contradicts the NAR’s “seasonally adjusted, annualized rate” interpretation of the data it collected. Existing home sales are based on closings (escrow clears), which means the sales report for November is based on contracts signed primarily from October and some in late Sept/early November. But mortgage applications began dropping off a cliff in late August. Clearly the NAR’s seasonal adjustment interpretation of the data is highly suspect.

Looking at the data itself  – LINK – you’ll note that the NAR’s data sampling shows that home sales dropped 6.7% from October.  Yet, it’s “seasonal adjustments” suggest that home sales increased from October to November, despite a massive plunge in mortgage applications during the period in which contracts would have been signed for November closings.

I’ve emailed the NAR several times over the years to have them explain their seasonal adjustments calculus.  Every time I am politely declined.  I will note that they use the same regression analysis model used by the Census Bureau.

The annual rate for a particular month represents what the total number of sales for a year would be if the relative pace for that month were maintained for 12 consecutive months. Seasonal adjustments, which are determined by using the X-12 Variant created by the Census Bureau, are then used to factor out seasonal variances in resale activity.

They do at least disclose that, although, if anything, that fact detracts from the credibility of their calculations.  Of course, if I were looking for credibility, I would not advertise that I use the statistical guesstimate package created by the Government…

I would suggest that a year from now, anyone who looks back at the data produced today by the NAR will discover that the number was revised lower by a significant amount.  But who looks at revisions?  The Government and industry promotion organizations know this.  It doesn’t matter how far off the rails their initial “seasonally adjusted” data strays, as long as they revise them at some point in the future, when no one is looking, it gives them plausible deniability if they are ever held accountable.

In the next issue of the Short Seller’s Journal, I’m going to present a comprehensive analysis on the housing market and the damage already inflicted on it from a 1% rise in mortgage rates.  Despite the fact that S&P and Dow have been pushing all-time highs almost on a daily basis, the DJ Home Construction index is down over 11% from its July 52-week high.  I will show why in this next issue.  You can access more information and subscribe to the SSJ using this link:  Short Seller’s Journal.

 

No Really, The Russians Hacked Us

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

Hillary and her supporters have vehemently asserted that “seventeen intelligence agencies” agree with the assessment that Russia hacked the election. It might be greater news to the American people to hear that there actually are seventeen such agencies out there. Perhaps Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama might explain exactly what they are beyond the CIA, the FBI, the DIA, the NSA, and DHS. Personally, I feel less secure knowing that there are so many additional surveillance services sifting through everybody’s digital debris trail.  – James Kunstler, “Deep State Blues”

The public voted with its wallet and truthseeking data reveals that in any election in which the growth in average household real disposable income is less than 3.1%, the incumbent party loses the White House.  The study goes back to the 1932 election.  Real disposable income growth was well below 3.1% in 2016 and the Democrats lost the White House.  It’s really as simple as that, for the most part.

In addition, enough of the voting public determined that, with the help of the Wikileak emails, Hillary Clinton could not be trusted.  In fact, the Wikileak oeuvre revealed that the entire Democratic Party was indefatigably corrupt.  At the root of this corruption is the Clinton Foundation.  But beyond that it was discovered that, among other atrocities, the DNC conspired to rig the Democratic Primary against Bernie Sanders and the current DNC Chairman, Donna Brazile, slipped debate questions to Hillary ahead of the debates.

The reaction to this by the mainstream media, largely conduits of pro-Clinton propaganda, the DNC and Hillary is to blame the Wikileak truth revelations on the Russians.  As a result, the generic fake news meme regarding the election results has turned into “the Russians hacked us.”

All this mind you in an utterly complete void of proof.  Where’s the proof?  None of Hillary’s supposed intelligence agencies can produce one shred of evidence that points to Russian email hacking.   Show us the money.  Please.   Lost in this entire Orwellian fog of lies is the bare truth, for all to see.  If the Wikileak emails revealed that the Democratic Party – led by Hillary Clinton – is profoundly corrupt to the core, what difference does it make from where the source of truth, the source of holy light, appeared?   

The truth is the enemy now.  Rather than fearing Russia, the public should be looking for reasons to not live in fear of the U.S. Government.

The same Orwellian fog has enveloped the gold and silver markets, especially as the facts apply to the massive demand for gold in the eastern hemisphere.  Mainstream western financial media has become flooded with highly misleading and outright fraudulent news stories about the precious metals markets.  In this latest episode of the Shadow of Truth, we dissect through we pull away the wizard’s curtain to shed light on the facts: