Posted originally on Mar 19, 2026 by Martin Armstrong |
Wholesale prices rose 0.7% in February, more than double expectations and the largest monthly increase since mid-2025. On a year-over-year basis, PPI is now running at 3.4%, the highest level in roughly a year. This is not a sign that inflation has been defeated. It is a clear indication that price pressures are building again at the wholesale level.
What matters here is that PPI is a leading indicator. These are the costs businesses face before anything reaches the consumer. Manufacturers, transport companies, and wholesalers absorb these increases initially, but they do not simply eat those costs. They pass them along. What we are looking at is the early stage of future consumer inflation already forming in the pipeline.
Goods prices jumped 1.1%, the largest increase since 2023, driven by rising food and energy costs. Food prices alone posted sharp gains, with certain categories like vegetables showing significant spikes. Energy also turned higher again, with gasoline and fuel costs rising. Services inflation continues to push higher as well, rising 0.5% for the month. This marks several consecutive months of firm increases, including sharp moves in areas such as lodging. This is not isolated inflation. It is widespread and embedded throughout the system.
The timing is critical. This report does not yet fully reflect the geopolitical escalation that began at the end of February. Since then, oil prices have surged, and energy costs are already moving higher into March. Energy feeds into everything. Transportation becomes more expensive, production costs increase, and ultimately, the price of food rises as distribution costs climb.
This is how inflation returns in waves. It begins at the wholesale level, then moves into consumer prices. Even mainstream economists are now acknowledging that the inflationary impact from rising energy prices and geopolitical tension will begin to show up more clearly in the coming months. That means this report is likely showing the starting point rather than the peak. This is the environment where stagflation takes shape. Costs rise while growth weakens, and policymakers find themselves unable to respond effectively because the source of inflation is no longer monetary policy but geopolitical events.
From a cyclical perspective, this is exactly what we should expect at this stage. As we move through this period, war and geopolitical instability become dominant forces driving economic outcomes. Energy shocks, supply disruptions, and shifting capital flows create volatility that central banks cannot manage. The mistake governments always make is believing they can fine-tune the economy with interest rates. They cannot control geopolitical events, and they cannot prevent the ripple effects that follow rising energy prices.
Posted originally on Mar 19, 2026 by Martin Armstrong |
What the Bank of England is now proposing are changes to ensure banks can actually use their liquidity during a crisis. For years, regulators claimed the system was safe because banks were holding what they defined as high-quality liquid assets. Now they are effectively admitting those assets may not function when they are needed most.
This comes directly from the lessons of 2023. Silicon Valley Bank and Credit Suisse did not collapse because there was no money in the system. They collapsed because confidence broke and liquidity vanished in real time. Assets that were supposed to be safe could not be sold without losses, and funding disappeared almost overnight.
The Bank of England is now requiring banks to simulate rapid outflows over the course of a single week. That is not a normal recession scenario. That is a bank run. They understand that capital no longer moves slowly. In a digital world, money leaves instantly, and once that process begins, it accelerates. Central banks throughout the world now realize that they are looking at a liquidity crisis.
The mistake policymakers continue to make is believing liquidity is something they can regulate. Liquidity is a function of confidence. Once institutions begin to question counterparty risk, they stop lending. They hoard capital. They shorten the duration. That is when the system freezes, regardless of how much money central banks inject.
At the same time, central banks have been removing liquidity through quantitative tightening. They expanded their balance sheets for over a decade, and now they are reversing that process. This drains reserves from the system and increases stress in funding markets. Even officials have warned there will be disruptions as liquidity is withdrawn. So on one side, they are draining liquidity, and on the other, they are trying to redesign emergency mechanisms to deal with the consequences. That contradiction is the entire story.
Growth in the UK remains weak, inflation is still persistent, and rising energy costs driven by geopolitical tensions continue to pressure the economy. Banks are already reacting by tightening lending and becoming more defensive.
What the Bank of England is really saying, without saying it outright, is that they do not believe the system will function properly under stress. They are attempting to fix a structural flaw that cannot be fixed with regulation. The entire framework assumes markets behave rationally during crises, but history shows the opposite.
Every major financial event follows the same pattern. First, there are quiet warnings like this. Then there are policy adjustments. Then restrictions begin. Finally, when confidence breaks, capital moves and the system shifts very quickly.
This is not about a lack of money. It is about a lack of trust. Once that turns, liquidity disappears regardless of how much central banks try to inject. What we are seeing now is the early stage of that transition, and the Bank of England has just confirmed they know it.
Posted originally on Mar 19, 2026 by Martin Armstrong |
For years, the press has insisted that every conflict must be viewed in isolation: Ukraine is separate from the Middle East, China is separate from Russia, and Iran is simply another regional crisis. But history rarely works that way. When historians look back at major wars, they rarely begin them on the date politicians announce them. World War I did not suddenly begin with a single shot in Sarajevo, and World War II was not simply the invasion of Poland. The causes were decades in the making. The uncomfortable reality is that when historians eventually write about this period, many will likely conclude that what we are witnessing today is the early phases of a world war.
One of the greatest mistakes made after the Cold War was the assumption that the ideological struggle had been permanently resolved. The collapse of the Soviet Union was treated as a final victory rather than the end of a phase. Yet no durable geopolitical framework was created to integrate the defeated power structure into a stable international system. After World War II, the United States and its allies invested enormous resources into rebuilding Europe and Japan through the Marshall Plan and establishing institutions such as the United Nations and the Bretton Woods financial order. Those efforts created stability and prevented the reemergence of the same ideological conflict that produced two world wars. After the Cold War, nothing comparable was built.
Instead, Russia and other former Soviet states were left to endure economic collapse, political humiliation, and social chaos during the 1990s. Entire populations watched their national power evaporate while Western institutions expanded eastward. Whether one agrees with the political narratives or not is irrelevant. What matters historically is that unresolved tensions remained. Just as the Treaty of Versailles failed to resolve the deeper contradictions after World War I, the end of the Cold War left grievances that continued to grow beneath the surface.
Now those unresolved tensions are resurfacing simultaneously across multiple regions. Russia is locked in confrontation with the West in Ukraine. China is challenging the global economic and military balance in the Pacific. The Middle East is once again erupting, with Iran increasingly aligned with Russia and China as geopolitical pressure mounts. These are not isolated events. They are overlapping theaters of strategic competition that increasingly resemble the early stages of great-power conflict.
The Economic Confidence Model has long projected that the period around 2026 would mark a geopolitical turning point. That does not mean a sudden global war declared overnight. Historically, major conflicts emerge through a series of regional crises that gradually merge into a broader struggle. The Panic Cycle expected in 2027, and the larger turning point into 2028, suggest rising volatility and confrontation across multiple fronts. What we are seeing today fits that pattern perfectly. If history is any guide, future historians may not mark the beginning of the next world war with a single event. They may instead look back and say the war had already begun during this decade but we simply failed to recognize it at the time.
Posted originally on Mar 19, 2026 by Martin Armstrong |
COMMENT: Marty, you were the first to point to Netanyahu was a neocon and they were using him to infiltrate the White House last year. You seem to be put in the middle of everything all the time. I had no idea Netanyahu went to school in Philadelphia, and that’s how you knew. Then you knew the Kristols. You know Europe well and have commented on how there has been a huge increase in anti-Americanism here, and you also warned that there would be a rise in antisemitism. It is questionable who is hated most here, Trump or Netanyahu. Everything has played out as Socrates has projected.
Al
REPLY: This is all Netanyahu’s scheme, along with the American Neocons. Rubio, who is a Cuban, is now trying to cause regime change in Cuba. These people will never stop interfering in other countries. I will do an update on the private blog. This on the one hand is going well for them, as they may have devastated the Iranian military, but there appears to be no regime change for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The IRGC is held together by religion, and this is playing right into the prophecies. The Israeli decapitation strategy of leadership is not weakening the government at this stage; it has stiffened its resolve. The Ayatollah has rejected a ceasefire. He has to know that Trump is on a short leash, and the longer this goes on, the worse it will be for him and in the midterms. The latest polls show he is -27 points just with independents. They never fogave Bush Sr for raising taxes after he said read my lips, no new taxes. Trump swore no more neocon endless wars.
The Japanese kamikaze Pilots were told to fly into American ships. They believed that the emperor was god so you do as god tells you. In the Middle East, individuals who carry out suicide bombings generally do not believe they are committing suicide, which is strictly forbidden in Islam. Instead, they believe they are performing an act of martyrdom (istishhād), a sacred duty of self-sacrifice in the path of God (fi sabil Allah) that promises great rewards in the afterlife. It is crucial to understand that this interpretation is highly contested and rejected by the vast majority of mainstream Muslim scholars and communities worldwide. It is essential to understand that the beliefs described above are based on interpretations of Islamic texts that are overwhelmingly rejected by mainstream Islamic scholarship.
This is what the Neocons fail to understand. You CANNOT judge an enemy based on your beliefs. All that matters is what THEY believe – not you. They underestimated Iran and they assumed that they would simply mine the Straut of Hormuz. The decision making in the war leaves a lot to be questioned.
The Israeli military killed Iranian Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib, the latest in a series of high-profile killings of Iranian leaders that have worked to destabilize the nation’s institutions and industry as the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran intensifies. This has been their agenda to assassinate the leaders. They did that with Hammas, Hezbollah, Syra, Libya, and Iraq. This same strategy is now being deployed in Iran.
Here is the problem. So far Trump has not been attacking the Iranian regular army. Perhaps someone has learned a lesson from Iraq. You cannot simply destroy everything for then what comes at the end is sheer chaos. What is critical is that the main institutions are left intact for a post-war situation. Assuming the Islamic Republic collapses, the people need to have the infrastructure intact to form a normal government. If they leave Iran as the did Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Syria, etc., then the violence will only resurface from the chaos. There will be radical elements the surface just as ISIS in the aftermath of Iraq.
A rare written statement from Iran’s new supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, promised retaliation for the killing of the nation’s top security official, Ali Larijani, saying, “All blood has its price that the criminal murderers of the martyrs must pay soon.” Because the IRGC is hard core religious, this makes it impossible to see them take some sort of leadership role. The best we can hope for is someone from the regular army rises up, but that could also end up in civil war.
So far, Trump has avoided not just attacking the regular army, but the institutions that will be needed postwar. There is no intention to occupy Iran as took place in Iraq. Trump has also not destroyed the pipelines of Iran understanding that a postwar economy will need the oil exports to rebuild. The biggest crisis that I see is Netanyahu who seems to want genocide in Iran and the real risk here is that he can act in his own self-interest seeking to keep Trump engaged if not drag him in all the way with ground troops. My concern is that Trump is NOT fully in charge for Netanyahu cannot be counted on for honest intelligence any more than the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. I knew Bill Kristol. He even spoke at one of our conference in the ’90s. If I remember correctly, he said taking out Iraq was to secure the future of Israel. He did write the book to justify that war.
In 2004, allegations surfaced that Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapons program, which was allegedly forged by Netanyahu to justify invading Iran back then. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) found NO credible evidence of such activities after 2003. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later claimed that Iran had lied about its nuclear ambitions, presenting documents in 2018 that he asserted were proof of a secret nuclear weapons program.
Joe Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned on Tuesday in protest against the war on Iran. “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation,” Kent wrote. So, what, in his estimation, was the reason for this war? Simple: The Israelis wanted it, and they get what they want. Of course, the Trump Administration is doing everything it can to now discredit Kent. Iran may be more of an existential threat to Israel, but the Iranian threat to U.S. civilians, service personnel, and interests abroad is constant and has been since 1979. They have cleverly switched the iss that Iran did not present a threat to the United States. They are claiming it was a threat only to those stationed in the region. The point is that the ONLY way a president can act without a declaration of war from Congress is to respond to a immediate threat. This is always the excuse for they used that against Iraq that they had weapons on mass destruction and it was imminent that they would attack the USA.
In 2002, Netanyahu addressed the United States Congress, saying Israel is certain Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction and that America ‘must do something about this.’ He also said the same about Iran. Netanyahu has been pitching this same story since 2002. This is his personal vendetta and it has cost America billions and approximately 4,492 U.S. servicemembers were killed during the Iraq War from 2003 to 2011. Additionally, around 32,292 were wounded in the conflict. All for Netanyahu’s vendetta. I had family members who fought in that war. They were not too happy when they found out it was all a lie. This is not even for Israel. This is for one man who has admitted he has sought the destruction of Iran for 40 years.
I like Vance, but I think he has an obligation to look at the facts. When Gabbard said Iran had no nuclear program, Trump said he had different intelligence and that was from Netanyahu. I think it is time to interrogate Netanyahu for he is also putting Israel at risk for his insane personal vendetta.
Let’s be real. Iran is believed to possess enough enriched uranium to potentially build a nuclear weapon if it chose to. But even if Iran suddenly produced a bomb, nuclear deterrence and the risk of massive retaliation from countries like the United States or Israel would likely prevent it from ever being used. They furthermore lack the ability to make a bomb much different from what was dropped on Japan, but lack the ability to deliver such a bomb. Yet Gabbard in her written submission to Congress admitted that the 2025 strike obliterated Iran’s nuclear program and that there was no effort to restart it. There was no imminent threat. May are starting to see this as a war for Netanyahu, not for the United States. This was an unprovoked action to fulfill Netanyahu’s 50 year dream of destroying Iran. That is the real danger here that he started this war for personal reasons and there is a risk that he will act unilaterally to prevent any short-term end to this war.
For Iran, the UAE is a prime location where strikes can simultaneously pressure Washington, hit the Switzerland of the Middle East, and disrupt global energy flows. Thanks to the regulations and Marxist agenda in the EU, capital has been fleeing to UAE. Attacking Dubai unsettles international finance and corporates, and generate worldwide attention. We had to move our people out of our Dubai office as well.
Iran can inflict maximum regional and global pain, testing UAE that has positioned itself as the Gulf’s safest bridge between East and West, and the future of the region for finance, logistics, aviation and technology. There are many foreigners living in Dubai.
While there is a shot that March will remain as the high in oil for right now and there could be up to a 2 to 3 month correction, this does not appear to be over and we can still see an escalation during the summer from June into September.
With NATO refusing to join Trump in Iran, there is now a reasonable risk that Trump will abandon Ukraine and let Europe fund that one.
Posted originally on Mar 18, 2026 by Martin Armstrong |
Alberta Separation is deeply emotional for many people, yet at the same time, INEVITABLE, given the global trend that is becoming highly influential. I have warned that the corruption within government is always what brings down governments for thousands of years. Once a centralized government seizes power, it cannot resist exercising more and more power. This will always lead to corruption in republican forms of government, ultimately bribing people in office to do as they desire. We are witnessing this not just in Canada, but also in how the federal government was pushing the globalist agenda of climate change, attacking Alberta, and even flying in a 16-year-old to tell people to surrender their jobs.
Centralized governments inevitably lead toward core Marxism, for that never benefits the people, but yields more power for the state. This always leads to the idea that the government can control society. Taxation and regulation rise, and this becomes the seed of corruption. We see that in the EU, as even Merz of Germany has now publicly criticized the EU over its migration policies. What began as a trade partnership has evolved into a centralized dictatorial government seeking total power over every aspect of European life.
We have seen this trend in the United States. Washington seeks to supersede state policies, even though individual states were promised the right to form the United States. Canada has suffered the same fate. The central bank no longer cares about regions and will raise rates based on inflationary trends in the East. In the USA, we have referred to this as the Texas/NY Arbitrage. When Texas is booming, that leads to commodity inflation, and NY suffers with rising interest rates. In Canada, there are regional economic differences, which is why centralized governments always overstep their authority, because it becomes about their power rather than about managing the different economies within the nation as a whole.
While the issue becomes emotional for some, who see the nation state as their identity, like a sports team, others see the practical individual test – what do I get out of this? All nations collapse and break apart because centralized government is always inefficient. This is what brought down Communism, and we can see it causing tension already within the EU as the government has interfered in the cultural issues of member states with its migration policy. It is inevitable that a centralized government that thinks it is in charge becomes increasingly authoritarian and always seeks more power when a crisis arises, claiming it could have prevented the event if it had just had a little more power.
Posted originally on CTH on March 18, 2026 | Sundance
Representative Don Bacon is openly and publicly in opposition to every President Trump policy. Bacon is a ‘professional republican’, a traditional DeSantis republican.
Appearing on CNN the Nebraska Republican says if President Trump were to leave NATO, “there would be a civil war in the republican caucus.” WATCH (prompted):
Posted originally on CTH on March 18, 2026 | Sundance
In fulfilling her legislatively mandated annual report called the “National Threat Assessment,” Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, releases the combined intelligence assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.
Additionally, here is the transcript of DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s statement to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence:
[TRANSCRIPT] – “I am here today to present the 2026 Annual Threat Assessment, joined by the Directors of the CIA, DIA, FBI and NSA.
This briefing is being provided in accordance with ODNI’s statutory responsibility and represents the Intelligence Community’s assessment of the threats facing U.S. citizens, our Homeland, and our interests.
As President Trump’s National Security Strategy highlights, America is blessed with an enviable geostrategic position, unparalleled assets, resources and a military second to none. Intelligence remains among our sharpest tools in protecting our interests and informing our policymakers and decisionmakers on key national security concerns.
In this assessment, we are following the structure of priorities laid out in the National Security Strategy, starting with threats to our Homeland, then shifting to global risks.
The defense of our Homeland is of utmost importance to the American people. Putting America first means committing to an unrelenting vigilance in service of our own citizens, borders, and communities. Recent efforts to bolster Homeland defense have yielded significantly positive results, but challenges persist.
For example, President Trump’s strict enforcement of U.S. policies at the U.S. Mexico border and regionally has served as a deterrent and drastically reduced illegal immigration. Based on Customs and Border Patrol data, January 2026’s monthly encounters are down 83.8% compared to January 2025. Encounters declined 79% compared to 2024.
The drivers of migration are likely to continue. Potential worsening instability in countries like Cuba and Haiti risk triggering migration surges. Smugglers who often operate as transnational criminal organizations view chaos as an opportunity for profit and will look to continue to profit from illegal immigration flows.
Transnational criminal organizations continue to pose a daily and direct threat to the health and safety of millions of U.S. citizens primarily by producing and trafficking in illegal drugs.
Under President Trump’s leadership, fentanyl overdose deaths have seen a 30 percent decrease from September 2024 to September 2025.
Fentanyl potency has also decreased, likely due to disruptions to the production supply chain.
U.S. efforts to work with China and India to halt the flow of fentanyl precursor chemicals to North America are demonstrating improvement, but there is more work to be done as there are still tens of thousands of fentanyl-related deaths in America every year.
President Trump’s aggressive efforts to more directly and actively target TCOs and reduce the inflow of fentanyl precursors has already had a significant impact which is likely to continue. (continue reading – pdf)
The opening statement is 8-pages in full and can be found by following the ‘continue reading’ link above.
Tulsi Gabbard is doing a solid job as DNI, against formidable opposition from all directions.
“It ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them.”
Posted originally on CTH on March 18, 2026 | Sundance
This is very interesting because Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer went to Paris last weekend to meet with their Chinese counterparts and organize the deliverables for the upcoming summit between Chairman Xi Jinping and President Trump.
At roughly the same moment that Bessent and Greer were meeting with China, President Trump sent out the Truth Social message requesting Chinese ships to come to the Strait of Hormuz and escort their oil. I said at the time of Trump’s message that Chairman Xi was going to have to negotiate through this issue carefully because it was very obvious that President Trump was not going to maintain any diplomatic pretenses when he met with Chairman Xi.
Yesterday, during the St Patrick’s Day celebration President Trump said the summit was cancelled. “We’re resetting the meeting and it looks like it’ll take place in about five weeks,” President Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in an event with Micheál Martin, the Irish prime minister.
Today, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed there is no scheduled replacement date for the cancelled summit.
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Keep watching. Bessent and Greer didn’t go to Paris for nothing.
Posted originally on CTH on March 18, 2026 | Sundance
Sometimes things are just too funny. Less than 24 hours after President Trump said Europe’s refusal to escort their own oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz might lead him to reconsider staying in NATO, suddenly ships are en route.
Posted originally on CTH on March 18, 2026 | Sundance
Vice President JD Vance was asked about NCTC Director Joe Kent resigning from his position over a disagreement surrounding the Iran conflict.
This could have been a challenging question for Vance to answer because both Vance and Kent are funded and supported by the same ideological donor, Billionaire Peter Thiel. [FYI Tucker is also in this stable] Thiel is a libertarian minded billionaire within Big Tech and not necessarily an ideological fan of Donald Trump or MAGA. Palantir is one of Thiels companies with CEO Alex Karp running it. Palantir is a major contractor within the national security apparatus.
JD Vance adroitly navigates the answer by saying once the President makes a decision, the role of all subordinates is to get behind that decision, and never openly compromise your leadership.
“It’s one thing to have a disagreement of opinion…That said, whatever your view is, when president of the United States makes a decision, it’s your job to help make that decision as effective and successful as possible…If you are on the team and you can’t help implement the decisions of his administration, he has the right to make those decisions, then it’s a good thing for you to resign. And I think that’s exactly right. It’s fine to disagree, but once the president makes a decision, it’s up to everybody who serves in his administration to make it as successful as possible.” WATCH:
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It’s obvious Team Thiel didn’t agree with the policy decision to attack Iran, that’s more of a neocon Team Ellison/Adelson policy move. However, JD Vance is very correct in how the Team Thiel horses within the administration should respond to the decision in trying to make it as successful as possible.
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This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America
Centinel2012 