The Federal Reserve is nearly done completing its revamp of its Washington, DC, headquarters with a price tag of $2.5 billion. The luxurious facility has come under intense scrutiny as many believe they are borrowing from public funds while already operating in a deficit. Yet, these funds will not be added to national debt calculations.
The Federal Reserve operates on a self-funding mechanism, allegedly, using revenue it generates from interest on government securities and other services such as payment processing. Yet, that interest is generated from public funds. However, the Federal Reserve does not need approval from Congress to finance internal costs as it manages to bypass the federal budget.
The national debt is calculated based on congressionally authorized borrowing. Since no Treasury securities were issued, these costs remain off-budget and outside final calculations. The Federal Reserve operated independently, and as such, it can build a massive new facility equipped with garden terraces, elaborate water sculptures, ceiling skylights, and a private elevator system to transport board members to the newly designed VIP dining suite.
There are several special lending programs budgeted through the Fed that will not be included in the national debt. For example, the central bank purchased $500 billion in short-term debt from local and state governments during COVID to push cash into the system. Loans provided through the Main Street Lending Program and the Money Market Mutual Fund Liquidity Facility (MMLF) are not factored. The Fed maintains some monetary policy tools absent of congressional approval, like discount window loans and overnight reverse repurchase agreements.
Foreign central banks may exchange their treasuries for dollars, which does not pull from public funds. The FedNow Instant Payment system for banks also operates independently, as does the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that funds around $630 million annually.
The Fed has a $7.4 trillion asset portfolio that is not congressional appropriations. Any losses are considered deferred assets on the central bank’s balance sheet. Now, the Fed differs from other central banks, such as the Bank of Japan or the European Central Bank, which rely more on shareholder capital and government-backed reserves. The 12 regional Federal Reserve banks operate as quasi-private institutions with elected board members, whereas the ECB and BoJ operate as public entities.
The Fed returns around 90% of its net income to the US Treasury despite the current negative press. The new headquarters may be excessive, but it is paramount for the Fed to remain independent from the federal government. Politicians should not drive fiscal policy, as all confidence in the system would be lost. A central bank like Turkey’s, which is completely politically controlled, faces ongoing currency crises and inflation because politicians only want to patch up the short term to ensure they win the next election. Congress should have no say in the Fed’s budget – period.
Posted originally on Apr 29, 2025 by Martin Armstrong
German Finance Minister Jörg Kukies is urging the European Union to force nations to drastically increase aid to Ukraine under an emergency clause. This emergency clause acts as a loophole that could allow Brussels to surpass defense investment parameters.
Kukies penned a letter on April 24, 2025, to Brussels to state that the “changing environment in Ukraine “requires a significant build-up of defense capabilities with a major impact on its public finances.” This clause would force EU members to spend up to 1.5% of GDP on Ukraine for the next four years. Kukies also would like the European Commission to consider expanding what constitute as “defense” spending, as it “adequately reflects the multiple threats to security in Europe” and considering “in particular dual-use expenditure.”
Incoming chancellor Friedrich Merz has already agreed to spend €1 trillion on Ukraine’s military and infrastructure. Germany is not “leading” Europe as many believe. Rather, it is dragging the entire continent into the grave. This is not about helping Ukraine. This is about creating the next perpetual conflict to justify more government power, more taxation, and the further erosion of individual liberty.
The German government believes it has the funds to shell out. Yet, other EU members have not masked their hesitancy to sink into debt at the expense of Ukraine. When Foreign Policy Chief Neocon Kaja Kallas attempted to bend the bloc’s hand to increase spending, a few southern European nations like Italy and Spain shouted that they did not want to excessively increase their debt. Spanish Finance Minister Carlos Cuerpo touched on a point that caused Brussels to shudder. If Europe believes it is acting as a solid consolatory force, then why not consolidate the debt?
Spain proposed a temporary special purpose vehicle (SPV) that would restructure defense debt from national balance sheets by issuing joint European debts through bonds or a similar vehicle. EU and non-EU nations could fund the SPV with a shared repayment obligation. Brussels is still considering the proposal, but rest assured that the top economies in the EU will not want to share the debt obligation. The entire premise of the euro robbed lower GDP nations through a failure to consolidate debt, and nations like Germany refused to forgive their multiplied debt after they adopted the euro because every nation will put itself first. It was a fantasy to believe that a continent could erase its borders and operate as one.
The computer has warned that Europe is at risk of a depression. The EU is collapsing under its own weight. The unelected authoritarian regime in the EU is working to destabilize Europe to fight Russia, and member nations must stand idle and watch their nations spiral into debt to spur on a war that was never their battle to fight.
Posted originally on Apr 25, 2025 by Martin Armstrong
Federal Reserve Governor Michael Barr is urging banks to begin collecting behavioral and biometric data from customers to combat deepfake digital content created through ID. These deepfakes are capable of replicating a person’s identity, which “has the potential to supercharge identity fraud,” Barr warned.
“In the past, a skilled forger could pass a bad check by replicating a person’s signature. Now, advances in AI can do much more damage by replicating a person’s entire identity,” Barr said of deepfakes, which have the “potential to supercharge identity fraud.”
“[We] should take steps to lessen the impact of attacks by making successful breaches less likely, while making each attack more resource-intensive for the attacker,” Barr insists, believing that regulators should implement their own AI tools to “enhance our ability to monitor and detect patterns of fraudulent activity at regulated institutions in real time,” he said. This could help provide early warnings to affected institutions and broader industry participants, as well as to protect our own systems.”
Barr would like banks to begin sharing data to combat fraud. Deepfake attacks have been on the rise, with one in 10 companies reporting an attack according to a 2024 Business.com survey. Yet, will our data be safer in the hands of regulators?
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) fell victim to a cyber attack after discovering that hackers had been accessing their emails for over a year. Hackers found their way into an admin account, permitting them to access internal communications of over 100 banking regulators. Former Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had her own computer hacked by Chinese state-sponsored actors who used a third-party vendor to access sensitive, unclassified documents.
Regulators have been unable to protect themselves, but they believe that they can protect us if we continue to share our valuable data. All freedoms are relinquished in the name of protection.
Posted originally on Apr 24, 2025 by Martin Armstrong
NATO has heightened its alert level, placing fighter jets in the “highest state of readiness” in response to Russia’s aggressive strikes in Western Ukraine. The Armed Forces Operational Command confirmed that allied air forces have commenced patrols over Polish airspace near the Ukrainian border. Zelensky’s refusal to accept any peace deal demonstrates he is taking orders from NATO and the American Neocons, who, my sources say, are operating now out of Paris and London to ensure this war does not end. President Donald Trump on Wednesday lashed out at Ukraine’s president, saying Zelenskyy is prolonging the “killing field” after pushing back on ceding Crimea to Russia as part of a potential peace plan.
The people living in Crimea are ethnic Russians, not Ukrainians. The total population of Crimea is approximately 2 million people, of which 12-15% are Tatars, descendants of the Mongol invasion of 1240. There is no ethnic Ukrainian population living there. This is purely a territorial grab for war with Russia and nothing more. The Ukrainians have a history of ethnic cleansing and hatred of other races. They even horrified the German Nazis by their cruelty. In this photo, they executed a woman for being Jewish. They buried her child alive to save bullets.
The ONLY way to stop this is for Putin to drop the leaflets on Kiev, tell them to vacate Ukraine, and you have 30 days before it utterly destroys Kiev like the Romans did to Carthage to end the Punic Wars. The Romans destroyed Carthage in 146 BC at the end of the Third Punic War (149–146 BCE), essentially to eliminate Carthage as a political, military, and economic rival and to prevent future conflicts. A combination of fear, vengeance, and strategic calculation drove this action.
After the Second Punic War (218–201 BCE), in which Hannibal nearly defeated Rome, Carthage was reduced to a weakened state but began recovering economically. Many Romans, like the statesman Cato the Elder, feared Carthage might regain power and threaten Rome again. His famous refrain, “Carthago delenda est” (“Carthage must be destroyed”), reflected this paranoia.
Rome arguably provoked the Third Punic War. Carthage had complied with earlier treaties, but Rome exploited a minor conflict with Numidia (a Roman ally) to justify invasion. Hardliners in the Roman Senate, eager for glory and wealth, pushed for total war. The annihilation of Carthage—burning the city, killing or enslaving its population, and symbolically salting the earth (though this detail may be later legend)—sent a brutal message to other Mediterranean powers about Rome’s ruthlessness in crushing enemies. Carthage’s territory became the Roman province of Africa, enriching Rome with its resources. The destruction marked the end of Carthaginian civilization and secured Rome’s hegemony over the western Mediterranean.
In this instance, it is NATO and the Neocons who have provoked this war with Russia out of vengeance for once being communist. They installed the interim UNELECTED president Oleksandr Turchynov (born 1964) and ordered him to attack the Donbas instantly, beginning the war. He called them terrorists because they wanted separation after Ukrainians massacred Russians in Odessa. There will NEVER be a genuine peace with Ukraine because NATO controls their leadership, and Trump has to come to grips with this.
The only possible way to end this war is the total destruction of Ukraine. Drop the leaflets as the US did to Japan, telling the people to leave. Europe will threaten nuclear war if they do that, and Russia has to target every major city in Europe. Then and ONLY then will the people of Europe rise up against their brain-dead leaders who take orders from NATO and the Neocons and stop this insanity. The French Senate just voted 372 to 99 in favor of war with Russia. Europe will be destroyed in the process if NATO and Neocons are not stopped.
The whole issue of hating Jews was a conspiracy that Communism was a Jewish creation because Lenin, Trotsky, and Marx were all Jewish. This is why Soros and Zelensky both pretended to be Christians to escape the hatred of Jews and the ethnic cleansing, all based on the idea that Communism was created by Jews, when it began in France as the Commune Movement.
Posted originally on Apr 24, 2025 by Martin Armstrong
Donald Trump has come out to say that he had no plans to fire Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. “No, I have no intention of firing him,” Trump told reporters. “I would like to see him be a little more active in terms of his idea to lower interest rates,” the president added. “This is a perfect time to lower interest rates.”
Perhaps the president realized he did not have the power to fire the Fed Chair, as I have outlined. White House economic advisor Kevin Hassett declared less than a week ago that the administration was seeking loopholes to fire Powell. Around the same time, Trump declared that he did have the power to fire Powell, ““If I want him out of there, he’ll be out real fast.”
Powell, who was appointed under Trump’s first term, has face countless issues from presidents who refuse to align fiscal policies to meet monetary goals. Donald Trump has been pushing the Fed to lower interest rates dating back to his first term. Powell broke step with Washington and announced that former President Joe Biden’s reckless spending was endangering future generations. Now, Trump is once again pressuring Powell to drop rates despite the fact that QE policies have failed, and he is viewing the economy as a buyer rather than a lender.
Powell is likely eager for retirement, slated for May 2026. The president does not have the power to fire the chairman, but he does have the authority to appoint the next one. Fed governor Kevin Warsh, National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, economist Art Laffer, and Larry Kudlow are all potential contenders for the job based on reports. Some believe Warsh is the frontrunner for the role, and Warsh himself advised Trump not to fire Powell before his term was due to expire.
Kevin Warch is an academic without real trading experience who has been part of the revolving door between Wall Street and Washington. Warsh, 55, has a hawkish stance on inflation, and although he backs Republican priorities such as reduced taxation and deregulation, he does not fully support Trump’s stance on how the Fed should operate.
Warsh served as a Federal Reserve governor from 2006 to 2011, and failed to see the underlying risks that would lead to the 2008 Great Recession. Warsh played a direct role in the negotiations that would later lead to the Lehman Brothers’ downfall, supporting the decision to allow Lehman to fail, spurring global financial panic. “The die was already cast” before bankruptcy, Warsh told CNBC. He failed to grasp the global nature of this decision, which was not a surprise but a deliberate choice to allow the firm to fail.
He was against the central bank’s QE policies in 2010 and warned that it would not aid in economy recovery. He resigned from the Fed’s Board of Governors in 2011 after opposing plans to purchase $600 billion in bonds to push more money into the US economy. Warsh blamed the central bank for enabling reckless government spending during the pandemic by excessively printing money. He sided with Trump in pointing blame at the Fed for permitting inflation to rise in the post-COVID economy. Warsh still believes in managing the economy through intervention, rather than letting the business cycle play out naturally. Tinkering with the system only causes the cycles to become more volatile.
May 7, 2026, is the next major target on the ECM–8.6 years from the August 2017 turning point, and two years from the critical May 2024 benchmark we just passed. Something historic is brewing for May 2026.
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