Canada’s last commodity exchange is closing. The Winnipeg Grain Exchange, which was established in 1887, will shut down for good after its owner transfers the bourse’s only remaining futures contract to New York. It is ironic that when a decision like this is made, it is often a sign of a major change in trend. Wheat peaked during the first quarter of 2008. We are just now starting to play with the Downtrend Line in preparation for a commodity boom into the 2024 time period.

I have been focusing on the energy output of the Sun declining and how we are headed back toward the climate getting much colder. People like Al Gore are politicians. He has no expertise in climate whatsoever. Nevertheless, he runs around the world arguing for global warming, preaching something that to him has become just a religion. He is THE person who made global warming a presidential issue that has stigmatized the entire world and prevented people from actually just looking at how everything works.

The markets are lining up and what they are showing is that we are in store for climate change, but it’s getting much colder and that is far worse than global warming. Civilization expands when the climate warms, and it contracts when it gets cold. This is also why Kim Jong-Un of North Korea used missiles to force the West to accept his country back into the world fold. Why? North Korea lost more than 2 million people when the crops failed in 1995/1996. The summer of 2017 saw a dramatic decline in crop production in North Korea, down by some 30%. They are headed to another cycle of cold and starvation. His father’s policies of feeding the army first has created a 1 million man army with nothing to do. People joined the army just to eat.

Everything we see in the computer’s projections WARNS that we are indeed in for climate change, but it is a natural cycle not caused by humankind. We are looking at a sharp rise in food prices in the years ahead. The closing of the Winnipeg Grain Exchange is strangely the way the commodity industry always works. You see mining companies close at the lows and expand at the highs. They can never see the future even when it punches them in the face. So stockpile food as we enter this period of rising prices. There will be shortages in the years ahead.

QUESTION: Why is the Fed moving to relax the Volcker Rule and allow banks to once again engage in proprietary trading?

I figure if anyone knew the truth, it would be you

Thank you in advance

PH

ANSWER: Yes, the Federal Reserve Board wants to roll back the Volcker Rule, which was imposed to make banks safer after the 2008 meltdown. The Fed is moving to begin the administrative process aimed at significantly reducing compliance costs for financial firms but ALSO the problem behind the curtain has been that the LIQUIDITY in the markets has collapsed. Since remaining participation in the markets is still about 50% of 2007 levels, removing the banks from proprietary trading has contributed to a completely new risk – the flash crash.

The rule was intended to bar banks with federally-backed deposit insurance from suffering counter-leveraged losses by restricting their ability to bet with their own capital. Financial firms have been arguing that the rule is unnecessarily complex and almost impossible to adhere to. This is partially true. However, prosecutors who do not know how the financial markets truly function have been bringing criminal actions and demanding huge fines for basic things that have always existed and are part of any poker game. They have turned “spoofing” into a crime when in fact if you have a large position, you cannot let the other side know what you intend to do or they will front-run you every day of the week. So if you pretend you will be a buyer so you can sell, that is the nature of the game. Even the Libor Scandal was not “manipulation” of the trend in interest rates. That’s is what central banks do. They were playing within the “noise” of any market gunning for stops as the floor brokers have done since the birth of trading. They by no means altered the trend of interest rates – that is the privilege of central bankers.

Revising the Volcker rule is now something quietly supported by five agencies and among policymakers behind the curtain and it is all being driven by the lack of LIQUIDITY. Even the high-frequency trading systems shut down in the middle of high volatility. With retail participation minimal, banks out of the game, turn up the volatility and the high-frequency traders abandon ship rapidly. This allows for wide gaps in trading that are a concern for the future.

The proposed changes will be opened up for public comment for 60 days. But do not expect any serious discussions with respect to the crisis building in the decline in LIQUIDITY.

The proposal calls for the removal of an assumption included in the original rule that positions lenders hold for fewer than 60 days are proprietary. Meanwhile, the plan would scrap a component of the test for determining whether a trade is for a bank’s account. It would be replaced with new criteria based on how the bank accounts for the trades, according to the summary. They want to provide banks with more flexibility to execute trades that serve as hedges against potential losses. Banks now have to submit continuous and precise documentation to prove they are hedging. This is really onerous and in a crisis, it will magnify the events if banks cannot hedge. Nonetheless, the central purpose of the regulation of the regulation to prohibit banks from speculative trading will be maintained, but there will be a wide lateral movement to really allow them back at the speculative table. They can alter regulations but they CANNOT repeal the Volcker Rule for that would require an act of Congress.

Healthcare costs have been exploding even in Germany. The revisions in healthcare of about two years ago did expand the coverage, but the expanded costs were completely unexpected. That means Germany is also looking to now raise taxes to cover the higher costs due to their legislative reforms. The reforms have brought in more people in need of care and relatives than expected.

Currently, the tax contribution rate for healthcare in Germany is 2.55% of the gross wage and those who are childless pay even more since they lack a family to burden part of the costs. Their rate stands at 2.8% of their gross wage. In the United States, the Medicare tax is a fixed percentage of your gross pay as well with the percentage rate of 1.45%. There is no income cap for Medicare tax, so all of your gross pay is subject to this tax. Your employer pays another 1.45%.

The statutory long-term care insurance deficit in Germany came in at about three billion euros, which was much higher than expected. In fact, it was about 300% higher than the government’s forecasts. The Central Association of Statutory Health Insurance (GKV) has come out and stated that the sharp rise in the deficit was triggered by the reforms of the past two years. The move is to raise taxes even further since once benefits are given, they cannot just take them back. But what is absent from the discussion is the deficit has risen not simply because of the reforms. This sharp increase is due to the refugees who must be taken care of even though they do not work or pay the tax

Just to Clarify, we are also picking up Capital Inflows from the EU moving into Scandinavia – Denmark, Sweeden & Norway. We also see money moving into Poland and Hungary which appears to be some diversification movement. What has become increasingly apparent is the mere fact that confidence among SERIOUS money is starting to realize the EU is a failure.

As I have stated previously, the failure to consolidate the debts (see our original reports on the Euro) reflects the failure to really respect the different cultures within the EU no less trust them. This is why the debt was never consolidated and they adopted bail-ins so that one country would NOT be bailing out banks in another. This has all reflected at its core a refusal to accept the principle of a federalize Europe that MUST include transfer payments among states without prejudice.

You cannot have a system that dictates from the center but then refuses to actually respect the member states are one political body. This European Experiment has been a complete failure because it is trying to create some sort of half-baked-country in name only.

The EU should have remained as simply a trade union. Leave it at that. Centralized control was the downfall of Russia and China under a communist state system. People know best how to expand and respond to economic conditions. Germany depends on an export model and Greece depends on a tourist model. These are starkly different economics models.

Moreover, the EU should respect the individual member states that one-size does not fit all. Furthermore, the average family is better equipped to save for their future than pretend social programs that if operated by a private individual would be a criminal charge of frau