QUESTION: Dear Mr. Armstrong.
I hope that you will please give me some advice on the following topics. Sorry for the grammar.
I live in Denmark and have been saving up some money that I want to invest. My options are:
– buying a house and rent it out (I have 1/5 in cash and need to lend the rest as fixed mortages) or buying stocks for the money or simple wait and saving up more money and then buy stocks or a house in 1-2 years when things fall apart in Europe? What would you suggest?
I already have some money invested in stocks (only Danish stocks). Is it better to sell out now (in 1-2 years) or hold on to them through the next crisis?
And how about in the long term (when war breaks out in 2024-2027) is it better to buy something else or save the money so I can quickly migrate to another place on Earth (with cash?)
Regards J

ANSWER: I believe the best thing is to remain liquid, and equities tend to be the better road rather than investment property which is not movable. You can open an account in the USA or even Singapore or Thailand. In that way, you can always move your money offshore as Europe become more aggressive in their hunt for taxes.

The next several years are not like the ’50s or even the ’80s. They are going to be much more choppy and volatile. So this is something you will have to keep an eye on for the trends will tend to swing every 2 to 3 years.

We all need a place to live. So what I am talking about is investment properties. They will be highly dependent upon banks willing to lend mortgages. As the banking sector get hit, you will find that the liquidity in real estate will dry up very rapidly.

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong; When I first brought this topic up at our board meeting about the split in interest rates between private and public, there was skepticism because such a proposition had never taken place in the short-term memory of our perception of history. I explained your theory and the rest of the members listened only because it was you saying this. That skepticism has now vanished. It is painfully obvious that the events in repo market have proven your theory was correct that the real rate has risen and the Fed has been forced to intervene to try to prevent real rates from exploding. Is this what the future holds? The free market will undermine the central banks?

KH

ANSWER: I understand what I have warned about is not in any textbooks we were ever handed in school. During a liquidity crisis in which we have begun post-Labor Day, the shortage of money forces real rates to rise and that can be very dramatic. Don’t forget that it was the REPO market which brought down Lehman and Bear Stearns.

In 1899, there was a major liquidity crisis when call money rates soared touching 200%. The Federal Reserve did not exist at that time, but the Bank of England (BoE) did. There was a surge in stocks and the BoE feared speculation. Their discount interest rates were 3% in February 1899. They intervened and doubled the interest rate to 6% in November 1899. This set off a major panic. The British investors in America were forced to sell assets to take money home to meet the liquidity crisis created by the BoE. This created a global contagion and the US market plunged into a massive liquidity crisis as well as imported thanks to the BoE.

The USA had no central bank so the call money rates were a totally free market. The week of December 4th, 1899, saw the US share market collapse opening BELOW the previous week’s low and plunged 20% in just two weeks. On December 18th, 1899, the call money rate touched 200% in the midst of this liquidity crisis.

When I say we have put together the largest database on a global scale of the world economy, I am not kidding. I fully understand that nobody has ever heard of a split in the interest rates between public and private that can be at odds with one another. But in assembling all of this data and allowing the global correlations to unfold, we actually have a shot at understanding how the economy truly functions and where we are headed. All of the economic theories we were taught in school have FAILED!!!!! Quantitative Easing for more than 10 years has utterly failed to produce inflation despite the vast increase in the supply of money. That alone stands as a witness that Keynesian Economics does not work.

I have learned both from my clients around the world which taught me to view the world from their perspective based upon their currency. Socrates has taught me so much by showing me the correlations that no one else has ever dreamed of. This combination has resulted in a different perspective that I fully UNDERSTAND will often go against the established norms.

As for what lies ahead, the Free Markets will dictate the trend. The central banks have lost control of the world economy and they have become the source of the problem. They are trapped. As time passes, you will come to see the full force of the Free Markets. BTW – it was also the Free Markets which defeated Communism. They are doing the same with socialism.

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I have a question: First you remarked that capital is terrified if Labour takes Parliament. I believe Labour won Parliament the first time in the twenties. Did that set off the sterling crisis of the thirties? It seems as though nobody really wanted to record the history of the Sovereign Debt Crisis of 1931. I think you are right. It would have undermined the rising socialism of the era. Was there a link between Labour and the fall of the pound as the reserve currency back then?

Thanks

WK

ANSWER: There is no question that if Jeremy Corbyn became Prime Minister, that would lead to the pound falling below par. In the aftermath of World War I, the US dollar’s growing dominance began to reduce sterling’s importance as a reserve currency. There was a massive run on sterling thanks to the win of the first Labour government taking office on January 22, 1924. They held it only between January 22 and November 4, 1924. The socialism which was engulfing Britain led to rising union strikes and militancy which really began in 1925 in the coal industry and then in 1926 a six-month coal strike began and a general strike which only accelerated unemployment. These events undermined the British Economy as there was no way the pound sterling would possibly remain as a reserve currency after Labor retook control between June 5, 1929 and June 7, 1935.

This is why capital is sacred to death if Labour took hold of Parliament under Corbyn for he is even more extreme than anyone ever was in Labour historically. The economic slide under the Labour government culminated in a massive run on sterling in 1931 and capital was pouring out to the United States. The Gold Standard broke down globally between 1930-1933 as Europe was clearly turning more socialistic at the time. The pound remained floating until 1939 and the outbreak of World War II.

World War II saw The Nazi strategy of forging British currency in an effort to undermine their effort to fund their defense. The Nazi government was counterfeiting British notes in massive quantities. By 1943 the Germans were producing 500,000 banknotes a month. Fake pound notes were causing major headaches for the Bank of England. To counter the fraud, the Bank introduced at that time a metal thread during the war to differentiate its issue from Germany’s, and they stopped producing higher denomination notes