Tag Archives: Money laundering

Apr 25 2023

The Great De-Dollarization Fraud of a Lifetime


Armstrong Economics Blog/USD $ Re-Posted Apr 24, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

COMMENT: Marty; I was in a board meeting and I just wanted to let you know one guy who is there simply because his family had a stake in the company with zero worldly experience, started ranting about the end of the dollar he probably read on that biased _____________________. I asked this fool, should we then move all our company funds to Russia or China since Brazil is too small of an economy? Should we stop dealing with Americans? He had no response.

Separating a fool from his money seems to be a never-ending fact about humanity.

Cheers

You are the only sane one out there these days

PY

REPLY: I know what you mean. The people promoting this BRICS nonsense have no understanding of the real world. Institutions cannot park billions in Brazil, China, or Russia. Especially in the face of war. The reason the Euro has failed as a serious reserve currency is that there is NO NATIONAL EURO DEBT! Institutions have to still jockey between the various risks of each country and all the Euro did was transfer the foreign exchange risk to the bond market. Sorry, I just do not see where the dollar is in some state of collapse.

When they came to me to create the Euro, I warned them that there would be no single interest rate without the consolidation of the debt. But Kohl never allowed the German people to vote on joining the Euro, so he would not allow the consolidation of the debt. I was told then that they just had to get the Euro started and they would worry about consolidating the debts later. Of course, that never came. Hence, the volatility in FX simply moved to the debt market. The bottom line – the US dollar is still the ONLY place for major institutions to park money – PERIOD! They are not buying Brazil, China, or Russia.

World Trade as a percent of total world GDP PEAKED in 2008 at 61%. It has been in a bear market that will not bottom before 31.4 years taking us into 2040. The sanctions on Russia have divided the world economy and killed SWIFT but it has also ended globalization. To think that the BRICS can replace the dollar with ZERO capacity for international capital to park in such markets is the delusion of absolute fools. China will surpass the USA, but only after 2032.

So here we go again. This nonsense is leading unsuspecting people to follow the piper to divest of dollars and move into what exactly? Most of this is propagated by the gold bugs who will NEVER listen. They hate the dollar because they think gold will rise then. What kind of a world will exist if their doom and gloom were a reality? You might not have any place to spend your wealth. I own gold NOT as an investment, but because of its neutrality.

There is such a major fraud going on with digital currencies with people reporting that the latest scam is using social media to tell people to transfer all their cash to a digital wallet, and BTW – here is the link! If you believe that one, perhaps you would like to buy the Brooklyn Bridge. NYC has a deficit and they will sell it for all the money in your savings. Wake up!

These people remind me of the famous drawing of a fool and his cat.

Apr 25 2023

The Banking Crisis of All Times


Reposed from Armstrong Economics Blog Posted Apr 25, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, Your knowledge and database on financial crises is really unprecedented. I googled the first banking crisis and it brought up only the Crisis of 1763, which started in Amsterdam. Yet that list published in the WSJ which showed 1683 as the first panic and the siege of Vienna was most interesting. I know you have written about the sovereign defaults on the ancient central bank in Delos. My question is, was there any major financial banking crisis between antiquity and 1683? I figured if anyone would know, he had to be you.

PF

ANSWER: As the 13th century unfolded, the cost of endless Crusades burdened both the crowns of England and France. Throughout the remainder of the 13th century, a variety of Crusades were aimed not so much at toppling Muslim forces in the Holy Land but to combat any and all groups seen as enemies of the Christian faith. Edward began his reign in 1275 with heavy debts incurred from the Crusades.

These endless wars resulted in the time of major sovereign defaults by Edward I of England and Philip IV of France. In 1275, Edward secured a financial monopoly and negotiated a grant of export duties on wool, woolfells, and hides that brought in an average of £10,000 a year. He then used this as collateral to borrow substantially from Italian bankers granting them the security of these customs revenues to fund his endless wars of aggression.

Edward imposed heavy taxes on the value of movable goods. At the beginning of this Wave 850, Edward defaulted on his loans from the English Jewish bankers, and then as 1290 began, to cover that default he expelled all of the Jews from England and confiscate all their property.

Moreover, this was the Edward Langshakes of the movie “Brave Heart” when in 1291 he attacked Scotland. As this 8.6-year Wave 850 peaked, Edward launched his very costly war against Philip IV (1295-1314) of France which lasted until the end of this 8.6-year wave came to an end in 1297.

The Riccardi of Lucca was perhaps one of the major international merchant banking houses to emerge during the 13th century. The Riccardi established branches in Rome, Bordeaux, Paris, Flanders, London, York, and Dublin, Ireland. They engaged in trade with Edward I of England. Prior to 1272, the English kings were customers of the Italian merchant who had exotic imports as they were purchasing luxury goods and would use them to transfer money to Rome. With the outbreak of war against Philip IV in 1294, a major credit crunch and inflation erupted which impacted the entire international money markets throughout Europe at the time. The value of gold rose against silver from 10:1 to virtually 15:1, which was a monumental distortion of the European monetary system as a consequence of these endless wars.

Cash-strapped, Edward sought financial support from the Riccardi establishment but they refused to lend him any funds. In response, Edward seized all of Riccardi’s assets in England, effectively bankrupting them. The Riccardi had derived significant benefits in dealing with the English monarchy. They held contracts with special access to the English wool market. The Riccardi banking establishment was involved in about 50% of all the forward contracts with English wool producers, which were in effect futures contracts in the cash market. When Edward confiscated all the assets of the Riccardi, his action backfired. Nobody else would then deal with England in international money markets. This led Edward I to impose heavy levels of domestic taxation, which led to civil unrest. This led to a constitutional crisis of 1297.

We all may know that Magna Carta established rights that were forced on King John on June 15th, 1215. After John’s death, the regency government of his young son, Henry III, reissued the document in 1216, but it removed some of its more radical content. This led to civil unrest and at the end of the war in 1217, it became part of the peace treaty when it acquired the name “Magna Carta.” Henry III was compelled to reissue the charter again in 1225 in exchange for a grant of new taxes. Edward I was his son who was then once more compelled to reaffirm the Magna Carta in 1297 at the end of the 8.6-year Wave 850. That is when Edward I was forced to confirm that the Magna Carta was England’s statute law. That is when it actually became England’s rule of law.

The Bonsignori bank was known as the Gran Tavola, which had become the most powerful of the Italian merchant banking firms throughout Europe between 1255 and 1298. The Gran Tavola was indeed the greatest bank of the 13th century with branches in Paris, Marseille, Genoa, Bologna, and Pisa in addition to the main office in Siena.

Philip IV of France was also strapped for funds. He chose the debasement of the coinage which was massive. Philip had no other course of action to meet the expenses of the war. He began as a massive debasement of the coinage. Silver began to migrate out of France.  This debasement only accelerated after 1298 when Philip IV confiscated all the assets Italian bank known as the Gran Tavola in France on claims that they owed him money, without netting anything with respect to his loans owed to them. This caused a major banking crisis in 1298 with the collapse of the institution which also held funds for the Papacy resulting in their loss of 80,000 gold florins. This was the first Banking Panic post-Dark Age. This confiscation of assets wiped out Siena and the city never again rose to the forefront of European commerce. By 1320, Siena was no longer a significant city in international commerce whatsoever which was a direct attack on the Papacy by Philip IV. This resulted in shifting the banking power to Florence.

A full-blown financial panic unfolded as silver migrated overseas. People hoarded the old currency and by 1301 there was virtually no silver remaining in the open market in France. Currency depreciation let Philip cover the cost of the war but it destroyed the credit of France and that ultimately led to France seizing the Papacy and strip-mining all its assets moving the Church to Avignon where a French Pope was installed. They then seized all the assets of the  Knights Templar and burned all resistance alive. The Knights Templar were effectively an international transfer agent. If you were in France and needed to pay someone in Italy, you gave the money to the local office in France and they instructed the brank in Italy to pay. It was a 13th-century version of a wire transfer service. That is why the French crown seized the Knights and strip-mined all their wealth as well.

Obviously, this banking crisis of 1298 was far beyond anything most people would have read about in a financial crisis. This is what I mean when I warn that those in power will do WHATEVER it takes to retain power, and religion never means anything at the end of the day.

Categories: Banking Crisis
Tags: 1290, 1301, Banking Crisis, Crusades, debasement, Edward I, Magna Carta, Philip IV, silver, sovereign defaults, wave 850

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Apr 25 2023

Is Your Money Safe in a Regional Bank?


Armstrong Economics Blog/Banking Crisis Re-Posted Apr 25, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

People often ask if their money is safe in a regional bank. Yes—if you keep it under $250,000 to guarantee the FDIC insures those funds. Some clueless minds brainwashed into fighting the class warfare thought, “Oh well!” for people who had more than them in the bank and did not care if the Silicon Valley Bank or Signature Bank failed.

My phone did not stop ringing and the bankers wanted to know if they should cover ALL the deposits. I actually lost my voice, screaming, “YES YOU MUST COVER ALL THE DEPOSITS! ALL OF THEM!!!” Aside from the fact that no one deserves to lose their hard-earned money, the primary issue here is that failing to cover the deposits would have completely wiped out small businesses.

Small businesses comprise 70% of GDP and must be protected at all costs. They must park large sums in the bank to cover payroll to pay their employees and operational costs. Small businesses would come to a standstill and banks would fall like dominoes. Unemployment would spike and the entire economy would plummet. We would see a massive banking crisis if all small businesses went under. More banks will go broke, it is only a matter of time, but it is crucial that deposits are covered

Apr 24 2023

Twitter Corruption Went Deeper Than We Thought


Armstrong Economics Blog/Corruption Re-Posted Apr 24, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

We knew Twitter was corrupt before the Musk takeover. We knew that Twitter had verified fact-checkers and the ability to de-platform individuals of power, such as then-President Trump. Yet, this piece of information has been swept under the rug. The government had backdoor access to view every user’s private messages. All of them!

“The degree to which government agencies effectively had full access to everything that was going on on Twitter blew my mind,” Musk told Tucker Carlson. Every government official and head of state uses Twitter from around the world. Twitter emerged as the favored platform for leaders to speak directly to the public in real-time. Musk also highlighted the dangers of AI in that interview, which is an important topic for another day.

Musk received backlash for labeling organizations as “state-affiliated” and later changed them to “government funded.” National Public Radio deleted their account after Musk declared they were “state-affiliated,” and Canadian Broadcasting Corp. and Swedish public radio also halted their accounts. Verified accounts with the blue checkmarks are only verified by supplementing a phone number. The blue checkmarks began 14 years ago when Twitter aimed to verify that accounts were real. However, they quickly became a status symbol for politicians, celebrities, activists, and journalists where their Tweets were seen as “real news” since that little blue checkmark indicated they were someone important. Some balked at paying fees for the verification, such as basketball star LeBron James, and Musk said he was personally paying for LeBron’s blue checkmark to stifle his tantrum. There are a slew of imposter accounts online now, but maybe, just maybe, people can do their own fact-checking instead of relying on what a government-funded organization says is true.

I do not think we realize how big of a hit the loss of Twitter was for intelligence agencies. EVERY politician and world leader is on there. We’ve seen how careless these politicians are with online safety (see: Hillary Clinton), and I have no doubt many used the platform to send what they thought were secretive messages.

Apr 23 2023

Dual Justice – IRS and FBI Finished Hunter Biden Investigation More Than a Year Ago…


April 22, 2023 | Sundance 

The context for the IRS whistleblower case of political interference in the Hunter Biden investigation gains a significant amount of context with this new revelation. According to NBC reporting the FBI investigation of Hunter Biden concluded a year ago, and the IRS investigation “completed more than a year ago.”

If the IRS and FBI completed their investigation, then where are the charges?   Now the ‘whistleblower claims’ start to make sense.

(Via NBC) – Federal prosecutors have considered charging Hunter Biden with three tax crimes and a charge related to a gun purchase, said two sources familiar with the matter.

The possible charges are two misdemeanor counts for failure to file taxes, a single felony count of tax evasion related to a business expense for one year of taxes, and the gun charge, also a potential felony.

Two senior law enforcement sources told NBC News about “growing frustration” inside the FBI because investigators finished the bulk of their work on the case about a year ago. A senior law enforcement source said the IRS finished its investigation more than a year ago.

The Washington Post previously reported that federal investigators believed they had gathered enough evidence to charge Hunter Biden with tax crimes and a false statement related to a gun purchase.

The decision on which charges to file, if any, will be made by U.S. Attorney David Weiss, who was appointed by President Donald Trump and retained by the Biden administration to continue the Hunter Biden investigation. There are no indications a final decision has been made, said the two sources familiar with the matter.

The IRS Criminal Investigation division, the Justice Department, the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware and attorneys for Hunter Biden declined to comment. (more)

According to the prior developments in the IRS whistleblower reporting, the “senior U.S. justice department official” who is interfering and lying under oath to congress is U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Merrick Garland is the unnamed official whose sworn testimony before Congress is being challenged in a bombshell letter from an IRS whistleblower’s attorney that also alleges a coverup in the Hunter Biden criminal investigation, The Post has learned. (more)

The issue stems from Garland testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Delaware US Attorney David Weiss would be able to investigate the Hunter Biden issues without interference from the DOJ, and that Weiss would be able to prosecute any crimes that may have occurred outside his Delaware jurisdiction.  As the story is evolving, Main Justice is not following the process as outlined by Garland, and the DOJ is actively involved in approvals or non-approvals of the investigative process.

The whistleblower’s attorney, Mark Lytle, appeared on Fox News with Brett Baier to outline the issues at stake in the matter and why congressional approval is needed before the IRS whistleblower can give specific evidence and testimony to the committees with jurisdiction.  WATCH:

Knowing what we know about how Main Justice is being operated in the era of Joe Biden, I would not be surprised to discover that Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco is actually the main character in this DOJ manipulation.  AG Garland may be the front man giving what amounts to false testimony, but it is likely Lisa Monaco pulling the strings behind Garland that are making his congressional statements false.

Apr 23 2023

A Decade After the Media Shifted Their Objective and Began Framing the Transparently Innocent


Posted originally on the CTH on April 22, 2023

CTH Admin Stella reminded me of an article written in May of 2013 when CTH was urgently, desperately, trying to awaken people to follow events to their logical conclusion as they were unfolding.  Events we chose to challenge.

At the time in 2013 George Zimmerman was under attack; then came Ferguson (Darren Wilson -vs- Mike Brown); then Baltimore Maryland (Freddie Gray -vs- Baltimore Six); but the natural alignment… the purpose of the events… was a leftist probe into weaponized narrative engineering in order to advance completely false and fabricated stories.

U.S. corporate media were testing how far they could control the outlook of Americans.

The shift in attack direction from media at the time was alarming.

No longer was U.S. corporate media content trying to excuse the transparently guilty from accountability; starting in 2012 the new-era corporate MSM attack angle was to falsely accuse the transparently innocent.

Read that again, because it was a profound difference, an inflection point.

Leftists in politics and media were probing their ability to engineer entirely false positions of guilt and establish fraudulent assertions of fact to support the framing of the transparently innocent.

This was new because media were now targeting the innocent.  In many ways what happened in 2016 and 2017, the dynamic of the Trump-Russia fabrication, was an outcome of these tests they ran in 2012 and 2013.

In 2013 CTH was trying to warn; to tell the story of where this was going to end up.  The clarion call has a similar resonance today, albeit with an increased urgency.

2013 – A Paradigm Shift is needed, urgently. It cannot be provided to you; you must develop it within your own mind – and you’d better do it quick; or you will lose.  (* Disclaimer – This post is a collaboration of thoughts from both Sharon and Sundance. Sharon has the keen insightful bits, and Sundance reflects the indignation – any curse words are Sundance’s – because Miss Sharon don’t cuss, ever.)

If you are a regular reader of this site you are generally a person who engages in intellectual discussion on daily events and more than likely a root cause thinker. This means you are able to grasp events at their cause and not at their consequence.

However, for some reason, even those who understand big picture dynamics are still comfortable sticking their heads in the sand about “motive”. Most people are still clinging to actual beliefs around a principle of ‘rule of law’ that applies to National Leadership.

You’d better change that thinking quickly – or you’ll be asking ‘what happened’ far too late.

There seems to be a willful blindness on the part of the American people, a chosen refusal to acknowledge the implications of the unAmerican and unConstititional behaviors, actions and outcomes we are being served on a daily basis.

It can no longer be presumed to be a matter of “I can’t see what’s happening” because a whole lot of normal Americans really are clean and articulate.

“I can’t see it” just doesn’t cut it.

Bullsh!t! You can see it, you are just choosing to reconcile the irreconcilable because it is more comforting to ignore the truth of it. You are scared:

    • You are scared of being labeled
    • You are scared of being belittled
    • You are scared of being Alinsky’d.
    • You are scared of being targeted.
    • You are scared because you have never been here before.
    • You are scared of being right.

Just be honest. Avoidance has become your survival mechanism.

It’s more along the lines of “I see what’s happening, but it’s scary and complicated and confusing, and if I admit that I see it, I will become responsible in a way that I am not if I keep pretending I can’t see it or hear it or maybe I don’t understand it.”

Our Republic has become Kitty Genovese screaming in the darkness, being assaulted repeatedly and viciously, while onlookers sitting in the darkness startle onto their feet–some trying to reach for phones or light switches while others try to hush them, accusing them of exaggerated reactions.

The screams reach some homes where the residents look nervously and silently at one another, really hoping that someone else will call the cops, because obviously something really bad is happening out there.

Now, like then, you, like those people in New York, look around and say well someone is going to do something about this usurpation of power and unconstitutional action. So you pull the comfy blankies of historical public leadership reference over your head, cover your ears, block out the sights and the sounds, and do nothing.

You don’t even accept the fact a woman, Lady Liberty, our republic, is being repeatedly stabbed, carved up and her flesh torn from her body. She is bleeding on your grass and her bloody hand prints are on your trees and sidewalks. You know it, yet you lie there.

Doing what? Really? If not you,….. WHO? Who is “them”?

Remember the visual illusions on big cards, (Rorschach tests) just black and white splotches that required you to “stare just right”– and when you did, you could see the ink-drawn cow in a snow drift? That’s the one we grew up with–yours might have had palm trees in it or something else. But you stared hard, knowing that eventually you would see a clear picture —ah! There it is! For just a minute, but you saw it there–for just a minute.

How many are sitting in the midst of this implosion still believing that if they stare hard enough at the national mess they will still see a Constitutional government and a Representative Republic?

Well, stare as long as you want. The details of a Constitutional Representative Republic will no longer come into focus because it turns out that the Republic was apparently stitched together with dissolvable thread like the surgeons use.

Why don’t we dare say what is so? Are we a bit afraid that if we give up the willful blindness we will perhaps start screaming and not be able to stop? Do we think we have so little courage? Do we really believe that we have no resources to bring to the battle? Or nothing more to contribute to the turning of the battle?

There are patriots who some might say resemble one of those slightly mad orchestra conductors who keep yelling, “More trumpet! More TRUMPET!” Many of you are such slightly mad orchestra leaders. Don’t be alarmed by some of the strange looks you are getting these days.

What is the source of this passive willingness that accepts illegal activity behind phrases like “they wouldn’t do that….” when they obviously are doing it?

In 1974, Patty Hearst was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army. She lay in a California closet in her wet and smell for days that turned into weeks. Finally, it made sense in what was left of her 19 year old mind to pick up an M-1 carbine and carry it into a bank to assist the SLA with an armed robbery. Passive willingness, no matter how troubled underneath, is a choice: there’s something that’s being purchased by the passivity –and something that’s being traded away for it. Transactions are happening.

Why do normal Americans get swept into accepting these somewhat silent transactions that result in their cooperation with those who care nothing for our Constitutional Republic? (Be sure of this–they really don’t mind if we disagree, if we vent, if we vote, even if we organize…as long as they get to keep doing what they are doing. They really don’t mind us. At all. Isn’t that obvious by now?)

But back to the question–why do the silent transactions happen? Perhaps because the alternative to passive willingness is active refusal–and there it is: the price tag for active refusal may actually be quite high–and will often be perceived of as just being too high–and besides that, is an unknown.

There’s a deep deception involved with survival instinct that prevents a true comparison from being made between what’s being gained and what’s being lost as judgments are made (often by default) in the midst of confusing and threatening events. Patty Hearst’s M-1 probably bought her a momentary sense of safety in her personal world gone crazy.

Those whose hold on power depends on deception are always able to find an audience of those willing to be deceived. Now, the audience of those willing to be deceived is a flexible group in terms of numbers and identities. Even those who have been in that audience for some time may one day walk away from it.  However, what is it that makes folks stay in that audience? What price are they afraid of paying? What deception are they unwilling to let go of?

While we use the word passive to describe this “willingness to continue in deception,” this is not an experience shaded in peaceful lavenders, mint greens and dappled sunlight. This is the deadly passivity of muscles that no longer fire; tiny electrical charges that no longer leap from one synapse to the next.

This is as passivity says: “I won’t begin resisting, because I know that once begun, I must continue. Rather than assert myself and perhaps fail (or get really scared), I will sustain myself where I am trapped. I will muffle my moans so as not to risk exposure and I will call it self-control. Winston Churchill would have called it cowardice but I will call it pragmatic caution.”

It’s desperately necessary for our survival that we become disillusioned–and quickly.

…It’s desperately necessary for our survival that we become disillusioned–and quickly!

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Our ally right now is anyone who stands beside us.  Our enemy is anyone who doesn’t.

The new sons and daughters of the revolution are going to look completely different. The Green Dragon Tavern may be a church, a park, a picnic table or a tailgate. The assembly is not focused on the labels of the assembled.  This mission is the purpose. The fight is wherever it surfaces.

Apr 21 2023

IRS Whistleblower Lawyer Outlines Issues with U.S. Govt and DOJ Interfering in Hunter Biden Investigation – Media Reporting Attorney General Merrick Garland Lied to Congress


Posted originally on the CTH on April 20, 2023 | Sundance

According to the latest developments in the IRS whistleblower reporting, the “senior U.S. justice department official” who is interfering and lying under oath to congress is U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Merrick Garland is the unnamed official whose sworn testimony before Congress is being challenged in a bombshell letter from an IRS whistleblower’s attorney that also alleges a coverup in the Hunter Biden criminal investigation, The Post has learned. (more)

The issue stems from Garland testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Delaware US Attorney David Weiss would be able to investigate the Hunter Biden issues without interference from the DOJ, and that Weiss would be able to prosecute any crimes that may have occurred outside his Delaware jurisdiction.  As the story is evolving, Main Justice is not following the process as outlined by Garland, and the DOJ is actively involved in approvals or non-approvals of the investigative process.

The whistleblower’s attorney, Mark Lytle, appeared on Fox News with Brett Baier to outline the issues at stake in the matter and why congressional approval is needed before the IRS whistleblower can give specific evidence and testimony to the committees with jurisdiction.  WATCH:

.

Knowing what we know about how Main Justice is being operated in the era of Joe Biden, I would not be surprised to discover that Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco is actually the main character in this DOJ manipulation.  AG Garland may be the front man giving what amounts to false testimony, but it is likely Lisa Monaco pulling the strings behind Garland that are making his congressional statements false.

Apr 21 2023

About The New “Affordable Housing” Fees on Mortgages that Punish High Credit Borrowers


Posted originally on the CTH on April 20, 2023 | Sundance 

Stop looking at the Washington DC Potemkin village; start looking at the financial system behind it that controls it.

You may recently have seen this story:

WASHINGTON DC – Homebuyers with good credit scores will soon encounter a costly surprise: a new federal rule forcing them to pay higher mortgage rates and fees to subsidize people with riskier credit ratings who are also in the market to buy houses.

The fee changes will go into effect May 1 as part of the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s push for affordable housing, and they will affect mortgages originating at private banks across the country. The federally backed home mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will enact the loan-level price adjustments, or LLPAs.

Mortgage industry specialists say homebuyers with credit scores of 680 or higher will pay, for example, about $40 per month more on a home loan of $400,000. Homebuyers who make down payments of 15% to 20% will get socked with the largest fees. (read more)

If you focus on the DC Potemkin Village, you view this move through the prism of Biden’s FHFA creating a policy to favor low-income (nonwhite) voters by punishing stable credit worthy borrowers.  That’s what the powers who control the levers, and create policy, want us to focus on.  That’s not what is going on.

Biden doesn’t control anything.  Biden is a puppet to the multinationals that control DC policy.  When Biden was installed, the people who control the money and wealth (Blackrock, WEF assembly etc.), the people behind the Potemkin Village, knew what the larger economic agenda would create.

{GO DEEP}. 

They knew BBB, or Green New Deal policy, combined with excessive govt spending would generate inflation.  They moved their money from inflation sensitive liquid and paper assets, into real estate.  Inflation raged, liquid assets depreciated, real assets (real estate) surged.   25% of housing was bought with investment dollars by institutional investors, housing prices skyrocketed – their investments increased accordingly.

The financial control operators avoided the consequences of the government policy they controlled.

Now, those same institutions need to turn those appreciated real estate assets into capital outcomes.  They need to sell the real estate.  However, the assets are now at maximum appreciation and dropping as a result of the central banking moves to raise borrowing rates.

How do they exit the investment?  They need a mechanism – a new policy to create the financial instrument that transfers the increased investment wealth back into their hands.

They need buyers.

How do they get buyers?  They create new policy.

That’s what is behind this new FHFA rule.  Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will create a new category of buyers that allows the investors to sell the real estate assets at higher appreciated values and exit their investment.  They will transfer the depreciating loss of the asset to the new buyers, like a game of hot potato.

Learn to look behind the Potemkin Village to the institutional financial operators who control the laws, rules and regulations.  This is all a continual game of wealth transfer and redistribution.  There are trillions at stake.

Look at who moves the money around and how they position govt policy for the shifts into and out of the financial system they control.   All of this is being controlled, and Joe Biden has no idea what is happening beyond the talking points that are put in front of him.

Apr 21 2023

March Housing Sales Drop 2.4%, Year Over Year Decline of 22% From March 2022


Posted originally on the CTH on April 20, 2023 | Sundance

As higher interest rates continue to put pressure on borrowers, the ability of the average person to afford a mortgage diminishes.  Higher mortgage rates lead to downward pressure on residential home values as fewer borrowers can afford higher payments.  Simultaneously, commercial real estate is dropping in value as vacancies continue increasing.

Put both of these issues together and already tenuous banks holding mortgage bonds as assets can become more unstable.

This dynamic creates the continual tremors in the background of an economy already suffering from high inflation and low consumer purchasing of durable goods.

A perfect storm starts to realize.

(Wall Street Journal) U.S. existing-home sales decreased 2.4% in March from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.44 million, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. March sales fell 22% from a year earlier.

March marked the 13th time in the previous 14 months that sales have slowed. The housing market had a surprisingly strong February, when sales rose a revised 13.75% from the previous month. But after mortgage rates ticked higher, March sales resumed the extended period of declines.

The housing market’s slowdown is now starting to weigh on prices, which have fallen on an annual basis for two consecutive months for the first time in 11 years. The national median existing-home price decline of 0.9% in March from a year earlier to $375,700 was the biggest year-over-year price drop since January 2012, NAR said.

Median prices, which aren’t seasonally adjusted, were down 9.2% from a record $413,800 in June. Home prices in the western half of the U.S. experienced some of the biggest gains for many years but are now falling the fastest.

[…] Housing starts, a measure of U.S. home-building, fell 0.8% in March from February, the Commerce Department said this week. Residential permits, which can be a bellwether for future home construction, dropped 8.8%.

The housing market slowdown shows one of the main ways that the Fed’s aggressive interest-rate increases are rippling through the economy. Housing is one of the most rate-sensitive economic sectors, and high housing costs have been a big contributor to inflation. (read more)

Before looking at today’s graph showing median existing home values, remember me saying this in 2021?:

“I said in June, at a macro level home prices had reached their peak (last two weeks of May, first two weeks of June was apex).  Obviously, there are some geographic home value increases still happening as COVID related regional issues and work opportunities are shifting populations.  There is also a lag and ripple effect that takes time to work through the economy.  The macro-apex will not be visible until next year.”

When I said that in 2021, people said I was wrong.   Well, with hindsight now visible within the data as it is reflected, look at the result:

May and June 2021 was the peak of year-over-year percent of change in median home value increases.

So, what was going on?

As CTH outlined in 2022:  If you look closely at the timing (keep in mind the data reporting lag) what you will notice is that financial institutions began a big surge in purchasing hard assets, specifically real estate, as soon as Joe Biden took office (Jan ’21), and the economic policy became evident.   Intangible financial instruments became an immediate risk as the professional financial control groups recognized energy policy would drive inflation (supply side) and devalued money would fuel it (demand side).

As an offset to predictable inflationary policy (the insiders’ game), institutional money (Blackrock, Vanguard etc) was moved into hard assets with tangible value.

This shift in asset allocation, institutional sales, helped fuel a false surge in home prices and their valuations.  CTH was writing about this in 2021, and sounding alarms as it took place.  25% of all real estate purchases were being made by institutional investors.

We The People got screwed. 

The dynamic was predictable.  The Biden administration economic policy, energy policy and monetary policy, was going to cause massive inflation.  CTH was shouting about it in early 2021 and warning everyone to prepare for waves of price increases that would naturally surface first on high-turn consumable goods, and then embed into longer-term durable goods.

Despite claims to the contrary, this 2021 inflationary explosion had nothing to do with the pandemic or supply chain shortages.  It is entirely self-created by western governmental policy; the collective ‘Build Back Better’ agenda.  You can see now from the background moves within the financial sectors, they too knew the reality and their money shifts reflected that despite their ‘transitory’ pretending they were mitigating their own exposure.

We the People were yet again going to be victims of specifically intended monetary, regulatory, energy and economic policy.

The investment class rulers of the WEF assembly shifted assets to avoid the pain that we would feel.   We “would own nothing and be happy,” and their shifts would position them to own everything and be in control.

Overall govt spending and regulatory controls drove inflation for these past two years.  The ‘demand side’ was blamed, despite the lack of demand. I will be proven right when history is concluded with this.  Interest rates were raised by central banks in an effort to support the policies that are driving ‘supply side’ inflation, not demand side.

Energy policy was/is crushing the consumer by driving up the cost of all goods and services.  To support the overall goal of changing global energy resource and development (a false and controlled global operation), central banks raised interest rates.  Various western economies, including our own, have been pushed deeper into a state of contraction by central banks crushing consumer demand, and eliminating investment via increased borrowing costs.

In short, the goal was/is to lower energy consumption by shrinking the economic activity.  This, according to the BBB plan, was needed at the same time as energy development was reduced.  These economic outcomes are not organic, they are all being controlled by collective western government agreement.

Within this control dynamic, there was always going to be a point where the reaction of the people to their economic reality means the financial control elements need to shift direction.  They will always maximize profit and minimized risk, while knowing what the larger objective remains.

Just like every other durable good, housing demand contracts as prices and costs become unaffordable.  The loss of equity within your home is damaging to your own value or ability to borrow against it.

From the perspective of an institutional asset, that same equity drop is an investment loss.  However, the investment loss is not materialized until the sale of the lower valued asset is completed.  Retaining declining real estate on investment books, creates an artificially high appearance of the investment result; unless and until the real estate is sold at a diminished value.

As mortgage rates rise, just as a consumer would pull back from the housing market, so too will institutional investment groups now control the slow dumping of the asset to remove the equity they pumped into it.  Much of the investment housing will be retained as rental housing, with the monthly rents being part of the returns on the investments.    However, as this dynamic unfolds further investment purchases of houses stop, because the asset overall is declining in value.  This halt of investment activity also worsens a steeper drop in home values.

Notice this line within today’s WSJ article: “The housing market had a surprisingly strong February, when sales rose a revised 13.75% from the previous month.”

What happened in February?  The BIG CLUB [Blackrock, Vanguard, Citadel, etc.] moved liquid assets out of banks into hard assets (real estate), to avoid a predictable banking issue which surfaced a month later in March.  They knew what was going to happen in banking, they moved their own assets to avoid it.

Apr 20 2023

The Richest Man in the World


Armstrong Economics Blog/World Events Re-Posted Apr 20, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

Bernard Arnault has unseated Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos to become the richest man in the world. The CEO and chairman of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton is estimated to be worth $235.7 billion. That is more than the entire GDP of some countries. Musk is now in second place with a net worth of $180 billion. To put it into perspective, Arnault has more money than Jeff Bezos And Mark Zuckerberg combined who are worth $127 billion and $81.4 billion, respectively.

LVMH stock has soared around 42% in the past year alone, and it rose by 17% YoY in Q1. The company’s revenue reaches 79.18 billion euros in 2022, a 23% increase from 2021. This is another indicator that current economic conditions are not hurting the higher upper class as the rich have not slowed their spending on luxury goods amid this recession. LVMH owns numerous designer brands such as Louis Vuitton, Tiffany, TAG Heuer, Christian Dior, Celine, Moet & Chandon, Hennessy, and Sephora. Arnault personally owns 40% of LVMH and has a 90% stake in Christian Dior.

This perhaps makes Bernard Arnault the most powerful man in the world. Once you reach the billions, money ceases to be money and becomes a tool for power. It is not possible to spend that amount of money in one lifetime or even among numerous generations. Even if you are a millionaire, you are closer to being homeless than you are a billionaire. This is a very powerful position and we have seen countless billionaires attempt to alter society simply because they can. Arnault seems to keep a low profile compared to others in his bracket, but he possesses the power to change the world for better or worse on whim.