Me verses Socrates


One of the more fascinating things is when people try to challenge me as an analyst and pretend it is a personal confrontation to try to prove me wrong personally. I have stated many times, whenever I have had a personal opinion that has been counter to Socrates, it is me who has always been wrong. As humans, we simply do not always see everything. We miss things taking place around the world or maybe too focused on one personal perspective.

Socrates writes over 1,000 reports e4ach day covering global stocks, bonds, commodities, real estate, and interest rates. These are ALL entirely written by the computer – NOT me. There is no human interaction. This is entirely Socrates. I find it so funny when people try to say of Armstrong will be wrong or whatever for they fail to understand this is the next evolution in the analysis. The greatest error in all analysis is human bias and the failure to see things from an objectives viewpoint.


Here is a Demo of Socrates so you can see – this is not me writing all of these reports.

How Empires Die


 

This is a special report which includes for the first time “The Dark Age Cycle” which looks into how do empires die. Sometimes they just collapse, yet at other times, civilization also collapses and moves into a Dark Age. This report distinguishes all the historical changes which have taken place and the rise and fall of Empires, Nations, and City-States. This dives into the monetary system and how it was reconstructed in order to ascertain the cycles that are so important to understand.

This report dives into global contagions and illustrates that while people have suddenly seen the economy as global today, it has always been that way. This analysis covers modern financial panics in addition to ancient and draws the analysis and common themes that undermine society. It would be nice if we learned as a society from past mistakes as most of us do on a personal level. Every parent warns their child not to touch the flame of a candle. No matter how often we are warned, everyone still was compelled to see for ourselves.

Society lacks that evolution from experience. Hence, collectively we keep sticking our finger into flame expecting somehow a different result. Worse yet, with every financial crisis, nobody ever asks has this taken place before? Was there a solution that previously worked?

Perhaps this is just why history must repeat. We can only learn from our past mistakes on a personal individual level. Society collectively seems incapable of ever retaining such knowledge. Thus, those of us who can see the trend is compelled to watch others repeat the same mistakes over and over again.

The Economic Confidence Model & the Shift in Trend


While we took the back cover of the Economist for 3 weeks during July 1985 to announce the beginning of the Private Wave stating that the dollar had peaked, the ECM has been remarked on around the world for its turning points. Money Week even got the forecast right that October 1st, 2015 would market the debt bubble in Europe. It was accelerated by the introduction of negative interest rates by the ECB and, of course, the very day of the Russian troops entering Syria and Merkel’s opening of the flood gates which unleashed the massive immigration into Europe which has been the very cause of BREXIT and the rising tensions amount member states.

This shift in trend is going to be profound for the pressure within the world economy has restarted and with a fervor. This has marked not just the very day of the Impeachment with Trump and BREXIT, but we are watching international capital flows intensify once again driving the US yield curve back toward an inverted position which has nothing to do with the recession. The confrontation that the Democrats have taken against Trump is really the total destruction of government and we can easily see what 2032 will be all about. There is no going back. With Bernie Sanders winning New Hampshire and the left rising within the Democratic Party, they knew well that they stand ZERO chance of beating Trump. Their strategy was to try to remove him to influence the 2020 election themselves doing the very thing they accused Trump about. The Democrats are desperate and the moderates fear their party is moving toward Marxism and thus the conspiracy builds to draft Hillary in hopes that the primaries will remain in chaos. With hindsight, we will look back upon this date as the day democracy truly died.

Meanwhile, the finances in Europe are beyond comprehension. The Euro has been in a free-fall despite the biased media all running headline that it is Britain who made the wrong decision. They are desperately trying to distract the people from the fall in the Euro and the capital flight which has been creating the drive into the US treasuries. On top of that, the REPO crisis has expanded as fear over European banks continues to escalate. So welcome to the new wave that began January 18, 2020.

Some people will ALWAYSdesperately try to paint the ECM as wrong or attack me personally when they cannot argue with the forecasts. This is simply the dark side of human nature which will always fight against the light. They are of the same character who killed people for arguing the world was round and not flat. They burned Bruno alive and rejoiced in his pain.

Why these types of people will always try to prevent any advancement in understanding anything is truly astonishing. It is hard to comprehend why they refuse to ever listen. What do they have to gain other than refusing to believe something?

There always must be a dark v light confrontation for that is the very essence of what makes the cycle function. So when they cannot challenge the message, they turn to hatred of the messenger.

Food Prices Due to the Little Ice Age


 

QUESTION: What do you think about Professor Valentina Zharkhova, of Northumbria University’s department of mathematics, physics and electrical engineering, warning that the Sun is about to enter a Grand Solar Minimum  that could last for 33 years?

WG

ANSWER: Food prices rose due to the first Black Death whereby 50% of the population died which created a shortage of labor. This is what ended serfdom and began capitalism with the payment of wages. Then the weather began to turn sharply colder as the sun went into a solar minimum for a protracted period of time. This was known as the Maunder Minimum, which lasted between 1645 and 1717. This was a period where the number of sunspots was generally fewer than 50 per year compared to our modern period of warming with 40,000-50,000 sunspots over a 25-year period.

The Maunder Minimum was a very prolonged period of minimum solar activity that lasted for about 72 years. Our model is projecting an initial low coming into play around 2022. The extended trend appears to be lasting into as late as 2061, but that should not be without years that show spike highs in sunspot activity. This does not appear to be a downtrend that is persistent into 2061. There will clearly be lower highs during this period, but the trend should flip back to global warming post-2061.

Chaotic Weather


QUESTION: Marty; the weather is becoming as chaotic as the markets. We have one day heat in Antarctica and then snow in Saudi Arabia and Baghdad. Is this part of the cycle going into solar minimum?

SH

ANSWER: Absolutely. It becomes chaotic at such periods. Some places turn very cold and others hot. This is all part of the normal cycle. It unfolded that way even during the 1930s. Of course, the climate change people claim this is proof of rising CO2 levels, but they never provide evidence to support their claims that this has not taken place before. I would just for once like to see the evidence other than constantly claiming everything is proof without ever showing a historical account.

We face serious problems for diseases will rise with cold weather as will food prices

Cyclical Waves of Innovation


QUESTION: Good Day, have you ever checked for cyclicity in scientific discovery and/or invention? if so, does your computer suggest anything about the next physics or mathematical breakthrough and what technological development might come of that?

thank you for all you do.

EAL

ANSWER: Yes, it appears to be a cycle of 51.6 years. Schumpeter called them waves of innovation that result in waves of creative destruction. Each wave of new innovation destroys the last. Cars wiped out horse & buggies. The internet is wiping out local stores, and technology has introduced streaming that has wiped out VCRs and DVDs.

Dr Easterbrook was Never Allowed to Testify at the UN


 

Wheat & Climate Change


COMMENT: Hello Mr. Armstrong,

Thank you very much for all you do for us little people. I am a Basic member just trying to move my 401K in and out of the markets to try to make a little extra for retirement. Unfortunately I can only make a move once a month.
Here is today’s temperature in the oil fields of the North Slope of Alaska. We have been in cold weather shutdown for about 2 weeks. I have been here 20 years and have not seen a cold snap like this.

Best Regards,
JP

REPLY: Even the data that the entire CO2 crowd argues that in 1850s CO2 was only 240ppm was derived from ice cor samples – not actual testing. They are so gullible it is beyond belief. The CO2 measurements from ice core samples is by no means accurate for it represents more of an average. It does not show the spikes that take place with war when it surged above 400 during World War II. Moreover, they are using a period which was a 5000 year low into the ice age.

What we face is more of the impact of this upon agriculture and food going forward not to mention disease. The flu season takes place during the WINTER not summer. Global cooling is far more dangerous on so many levels.

When we look at markets, Wheat elected TWO Yearly Bullish Reversals at the end of 2019. The major resistance begin at the 800 level and our minimum target would be 860 by the top of this Economic Confidence Model come 2024. The markets are reflecting global cooling is on its way – not global warming.

Climate Change & the Inability of Rational Thought


COMMENT: Marty; I find it really interesting how people try to pretend you are wrong and claim it is warm where they are or because of some fluke one day high in the Antarctic. It seems to me these people are the lowest on the totem pole and are not very bright.  They are incapable of seeing the whole and are just Greta worshipers. Why are people, such idiots? Is there any hope for them? Or should we just write them off as not smart enough to even hold a conversation? There are also so many records broken for the past three years during each winter? They just never look beyond the headlines.

PB

ANSWER: I learned a long time ago from a friend who was a medical doctor that there were two primary methods by which people think. There is a linear thinker who can only see in a straight line. They are often the A student because they just memorize and are incapable of creativity. As the saying goes, they end up working for the C students who have the creativity and are dynamic thinkers who connect the dots and see everything around them. The B student typically takes a safe job with the government.

This winter is getting colder each year. I flew to Cancun to try to get warm and it was just in the 70s and was too cold to swim. This season has been smashing records for snowfall. I find it curious how these people send nasty emails to me yet are incapable of looking at the forecasts they cling to about global warming refusing to be objective. How about not bad considering the UN’s climate science body (IPCC) said in 2001 that snow would become rare! They had forecast in 2007 that Himalayan glaciers would melt away by 2035. They have come out and finally admitted that the forecast was unfounded. How about the forecasts: “Goodbye winter. Never again snow?” Der Spiegel, 1 April 2000. In 2007 they were forecasting all ice would be gone by 2012. A list goes on and on about every forecast these people have made has been wrong. They assume whatever trend is in motion will carry on forever. They never consider there is such a thing as a natural cycle.

You cannot reason with such people. They are incapable of rational independent thought. Above all, they offer no proof, just speculation based on linear assumptions. They have succeeded in destroying the European economy. Just watch the next 4 years

Angkor Wat & Its Decline and Fall


QUESTION: Angkor Wat was abandoned and the whole society seems to have vanished. I saw somewhere that this was due to climate change and the drying up of their canal system. Is this something that shows in Socrates?

Best regards

MU (Sweden)

ANSWER: The fall of Angkor Wat was attributed to climate and abuse, but that is just wrong. The real story about the Angkor civilization primarily involves religion and the shift from a Private to a Public Wave marking its collapse. The Angkor civilization was established in 802 AD, which interestingly came at the beginning of the third wave in the current group of 309.6-year intervals. That wave group will ultimately peak in 2032, bringing major change to the world economy, which may even involve religion as well.

The Angkor civilization’s heartland and capital city was on the banks of the Tonle Sap Lake in northwest Cambodia. The Angkorian state was founded and grew during a period of favorable climate with abundant rainfall. This much is true as with most civilizations during warming periods. At its height, Angkorian rulers probably controlled a large portion of mainland Southeast Asia.

The Angkor civilization peaked the early 1100s, completing one wave of 309.6-years in 1104 AD. This was when the construction began on the Angkor Wat temple site. But we must look closely here for religion also came into play. The temple was constructed as a re-creation of the Hindu universe. There were five sandstone towers that rose above the four temple enclosures. This represented the peaks of Mount Meru, the center of the universe. The temple complex is surrounded by a very large moat which symbolizes the Sea of Milk from which “amrita,” an elixir of immortality, was created.

The peak in the culture took place around 1104 in conjunction with the peaks of the Economic Confidence Model. That is when there was a shift in culture. Indeed, by the end of the 13th century, numerous changes were taking place. The last Sanskrit inscription dates to 1295. The last inscription in Khmer, the language of Cambodia, appears a few decades later in 1327. As the ECM shifted from a Private to a Public wave, not only did society become more regimented, but the religion began to change as well. There was a shift from Hinduism, which was the theme of the Temple, to the region-wide adoption of Theravada Buddhism.

Buddhism and Hinduism agree on karma, dharma, moksha, and reincarnation. They are different in that Buddhism rejects the priests of Hinduism, the formal rituals, and the caste system. Buddha urged people to seek enlightenment through meditation. Therefore, this religious shift brought the caste system to an end. The Private Wave represented the rise in individualism and the anti-government sentiment we see even today. The priests of Hinduism were overthrown, which interestingly corresponded with the shift in the ECM.

This religious shift had a profound disruption on the culture and included political changes. No longer was there state-sponsored stone temples nor was there a royal bureaucracy. This was all rejected and overthrown. Everything shifted to community-based Buddhist pagodas that were now constructed from wood. Part of this religious shift to Buddhism took place simultaneously with an increase in maritime trade with China. This shift in the economic structure combined with the religious shift from Hinduism to Buddhism meant that the entire facade of Angkor Wat was no longer religiously acceptable.

With trading shifting to maritime, the capital was relocated further south, near the modern capital of Phnom Penh. With international trade becoming more important, moving the capital to the south allowed rulers to expand their economic powers. Clearly, the abandonment of Angkor Wat was primarily due to religion and the expansion of international trade.

Insofar as climate is concerned, claims that global warming destroyed the city are not valid. The Paleoclimate research in the region clearly reveals that there was a region-wide environmental change in climate because climate is always changing. There was a series of decades-long droughts, but these were also interspersed with heavy monsoons. The impact of this in agriculture no doubt sparked the development of international trade.

Other claims that the Thai invaded and sacked the city of Angkor Wat by the 15th century. The capital had already been moved which meant that Angkor Wat was easy prey and no longer economically important in Cambodia.

Therefore, the shift that truly undermined Angkor Wat was the one which saw Buddhism rise, making the entire complex an antiquated religious place that was no longer respecte