Category Archives: Financial

New Jersey Senate Unanimously Votes to End Sales Tax on Sound Money

As you can see from the below article from the Sound Money Defense League, the New Jersey Senate has once again voted unanimously to eliminate tax on Sound Money. In the last session, both the Assembly and Senate were unanimous. The Governor pulled a pocket veto and squashed the bill. While we still need the bill to come out of committee and then to the Assembly for a vote, let’s hope that the Governor signs it this time. And if not the Legislature will push a veto to override the Governor.

Please consider contacting the Commerce, Economic Development and Agriculture committee here.

Please see below from article about New Jersey from the Sound Money Defense League:

(Trenton, New Jersey) — Senators in New Jersey have voted on Senate Bill 721 unanimously to end the sales tax on purchases of gold and silver.

For the second time in four months, the New Jersey Senate has voted unanimously to end their outdated practice of taxing sound money. The Assembly bill, A2812, is expected to receive a hearing before the Commerce, Economic Development and Agriculture committee soon.

Earlier this year, A5294/S1825 had passed out of both committees and both chambers of the New Jersey legislature without a single “no” vote. This popular bill had more than a dozen cosponsors and had unanimous approval in each legislative chamber. Despite this, Gov. Murphy chose not to enact the bill into law.

(continues here)

THE FINANCIAL SYSTEM HAS REACHED THE END

By Egon von Greyerz

https://goldswitzerland.com/the-financial-system-has-reached-the-end

Here are a few of the SINE QUA NON (indispensable conditions) for gold ownership:

  • Gold must be held in physical form. No funds, ETFs or bank held gold. 
  • The investor must have direct access to his own gold bars/coins. 
  • Any counterparty must be eliminated whenever possible. 
  • Gold must be stored in ultra safe vaults outside the banking system. 
  • Gold should not be stored in a major city.
  • Gold must be insured.
  • Only gold that you are prepared to lose should be stored at home. 
  • Gold should be stored outside your country of residence and in a gold friendly jurisdiction.
  • The country where the gold is stored must have a long history of democracy, political stability and peace.  

Silver: A Sure Thing?

Here is another wake up call to those whom are on the fence about precious metals, specifically $ilver and gold. Of course platinum and palladium are a play as well. A writer that I follow, Ted Butler has a long time understanding of precious metals market. His commentary is what I have quoted below.

Be sure to click the link below for the full story. Well worth it’s weight in $silver!!

The Code Red market emergency that I started writing about in July is very much in full force and about to make its presence felt.  The prospects of a price explosion are now better than ever, thanks to the unmistakable deepening physical shortage and the likely continued refusal of the 4 and 8 big shorts to add aggressively to short positions. That silver will explode in price in the not-too-distant future looks like a sure thing. Don’t let any last-minute price smashes scare you out of silver positions, as such rigged downdrafts would appear to be the tail-end of a 40-year epic silver price manipulation.

From Ted Butler

Centralization & the Death of Capitalism, the Middle Class and Democracy

Matthew Piepenburg

By Matthew Piepenburg
August 15, 2023

Matthew Piepenburg describes his visit to the united States and what he is seeing.

In this latest conversation with Tom Bodrovics of Palisades Gold Radio, Matterhorn Asset Management partner, Matthew Piepenburg, offers his latest assessments on the American economic and political decline.

Piepenburg opens with a sober critique of the slow-drip toward increasing but now undeniable centralization in American markets and society. The net result is an ephemeral yet tragic demise of both classic capitalism and true democracy. 

Instead, what Piepenburg sees now and ahead are more signs of a dystopian form of modern feudalism in which a political and financial minority operate behind a façade of liberalism as lords over a middle-class falling deeper into politically ignored serfdom. He unpacks the open marriage between corporate and governmental powers (weaponized/corporatized  media, science, justice system, markets, banking, currencies etc.) which more resemble Mussolini’s definition of fascism than the democratic ideals of America’s founding fathers.

Not surprisingly, the foregoing theme of centralization incudes the frog-boil toward more regional bank failures, the duplicity of the Davos crowd and the Trojan horse of CBDC, which Piepenburg describes as “horrifying.” Ultimately, Piepenburg sees an ironic yet undeniably cornered Fed whose alleged war against inflation will only create more inflation. Powell’s “higher-for-longer” policy to fight the CPI is only making Uncle Sam’s grotesque debt levels grow equally “higher for longer.” As a result, more mouse-click money will be needed to monetize this embarrassing bar tab, which by definition, means more inflation and hence currency debasement ahead—all of which is bad for America but good for gold.

Click below for video link.

The End of the Great Keynesian Experiment

The US government has now morphed into a spending machine. Forget the fact that no new money actually gets printed, only digits in the computer ledger, now we have out spent the entire US government since our founding.

https://www.sprottmoney.com/blog/end-of-great-keynesian-experiment

Got Gold? Got $ilver? Get some before the great vacuum begins.

Will Half the World Dump the US Dollar?

Half the world to dump U.S. dollars in future, causing ‘tsunami of inflation’ and asset price ‘collapse’, paving the way for CBDCs and The Great Reset – Andy Schectman | Kitco News

“As the world moves away from the U.S. dollar as a world reserve asset, dollars will be dumped globally, causing a “tsunami of inflation” in the United States as the currency returns to American shores. Interest rates will rise accordingly, followed by a “collapse” in asset prices, which would be used to usher in Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and The Great Reset.

This dire scenario is the forecast of Andy Schectman, President and Owner of Miles Franklin and an expert on monetary and economic history. Schectman, who has three decades of experience in the precious metals sector, said that the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) coalition could lead the charge to develop their own reserve currency which would compete against the U.S. dollar.

“The BRICS are, I think, coalescing against the dollar, the perceived hypocrisy and hegemony of the dollar,” he said. “We’ve already been told that the BRICS currency would be pegged to gold or to commodities, the assumption being that gold is one of the commodities.”

The BRICS are meeting in Durban, South Africa in August, and one of their agenda items is the development of an alternative to the U.S. dollar.

Schectman told Michelle Makori, Lead Anchor and Editor-in-Chief at Kitco News, that the dollar’s “weaponization” during the Russian war with Ukraine has hastened the move to “dump” dollars. He suggested that Western sanctions on Russia, as well as expelling Russia from the SWIFT payment system, has had a chilling effect, deterring other nations from using the dollar.

“Since the weaponization of the dollar in 2022, it [de-dollarization] seems to be spinning much, much faster,” Schectman observed.

He pointed to Saudi Arabia, who has recently stated that it is open to accepting other currencies in exchange for its oil, as a potential catalyst for massive de-dollarization.”

The Mother of all Economic Crises

Nouriel Roubini, a former advisor to the International Monetary Fund and member of President Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisors, was one of the few “mainstream” economists to predict the collapse of the housing bubble. Now Roubini is warning that the staggering amounts of debt held by individuals, businesses, and the government will soon lead to the “mother of all economic crises.”

Roubini properly blames the creation of a debt-based economy on the near-or-at-zero interest rate and quantitative easing policies pursued by the Federal Reserve and other central banks. The inevitable result of the zero-interest and quantitative easing policies is price inflation wreaking havoc on the American people.

The Fed has been trying to eliminate price inflation with a series of interest rate increases. So far, these rate increases have not significantly reduced price inflation. This is because rates remain at historic lows. Yet the rate increases have had negative economic effects, including a decline in the demand for new homes. Increasing interest rates make it impossible for many middle- and working-class Americans to afford a monthly mortgage payment for even a relatively inexpensive home.

The main reason the Fed cannot raise rates to anywhere near what they would be in a free market is the effect it would have on the federal government’s ability to manage its debt. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), interest on the national debt is already on track to consume 40 percent of the federal budget by 2052 and will surpass defense spending by 2029! A small interest rate increase can raise yearly federal debt interest rate payments by many billions of dollars, increasing the amount of the federal budget devoted solely to servicing the debt.

The federal government’s fiscal picture is made worse by the fact that the Social Security “Trust Fund” will begin to run deficits by 2035 while the Medicare Trust Fund will run deficits by 2028. The looming bankruptcy of the two major entitlement programs, combined with the unwillingness of most in Congress to reduce either welfare or warfare spending, puts the Fed in a bind. If it raises rates to the levels needed to really combat price inflation, the increase in interest payments will impose hardships on individuals and businesses, as well as raise federal interest payments to unsustainable levels. This will cause a major economic crisis including a government default on its debt causing a rejection of the dollar’s world reserve currency status. Also, if the Fed continues to facilitate federal deficits by monetizing the debt, the result will be an economic crisis caused by a collapse in the dollar’s value and rejection of the dollar’s world reserve status.

The crisis will lead to social unrest and violence, as well as increased popularity of authoritarian movements on both the left and the right. This will lead to government crackdowns on civil liberties and increased government control of our economy. The only bright spot is this crisis will also fuel interest in the ideas of liberty and could even help bring about a return to limited, constitutional government, free markets, individual liberty, and a foreign policy of peaceful trade with all. Those of us who know the truth have two responsibilities. The first is to make the necessary plans to ensure our families can survive the forthcoming turmoil. The second is to do all we can to introduce as many people as possible to the ideas of liberty.

Written by Ron Paul
Monday December 12, 2022

(L-R) U.S. Ambassador to Colombia Philip Goldberg, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, President Joe Biden, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin meet with Colombian President Ivan Duque at the White House on March 10, 2022. The leaders spoke about recent meetings between the U.S. and Venezuela, where the possibility of easing U.S. oil sanctions on Venezuela were discussed after Biden had banned Russian oil imports to the U.S. (Doug Mills/Pool/Getty Images)

The “REAL” Reset is Coming

By Victor Davis Hanson as printed in Epoch Times

President Joe Biden believes the Ukraine war will mark the start of a “new world order.” In the middle of the COVID global pandemic, Klaus Schwab and global elites likewise announced a “great reset.”

Accordingly, the nations of the world would have to surrender their sovereignty to an international body of experts. They would enlighten us on taxes, diversity, and green policies.

When former President Donald Trump got elected in 2016, marquee journalists announced partisan reporting would have to displace the old, supposedly disinterested approach to the news.

There is a common theme here.

In normal times progressives worry that they do not have public support for their policies. Only in crises do they feel that the political Left and media can merge to use apocalyptic times to ram through usually unpopular approaches to foreign and domestic problems.

We saw that last year: fleeing from Afghanistan, the embrace of critical race theory, trying to end the filibuster, pack the court, junk the Electoral College, and nationalize voting laws.

These “new orders” and “resets” always entail far bigger government and more unelected, powerful bureaucracies. Elites assume that their radical changes in energy use, media reporting, voting, sovereignty, and racial and ethnic quotas will never quite apply to themselves, the architects of such top-down changes.

So we common folk must quit fossil fuels, but not those who need to use corporate jets. Walls will not mar our borders but will protect the homes of Nancy Pelosi, Mark Zuckerberg, and Bill Gates.

Hunter Biden’s lost laptop will be declared, by fiat, not news. In contrast, the fake Alfa Bank “collusion” narrative will be national headline news for weeks.

Middle class lifestyles will be curbed as we are instructed to strive for sustainability and transition to apartment living and mass transit. But the Obamas will still keep their three mansions, and Silicon Valley futurists will insist on exemptions for their yachts.

In truth, we are about to see a radical reset—of the current reset. It will be a different sort of transformation than the elites are expecting and one that they should greatly fear.

The world and the United States are furious over hyperinflation that may soon exceed 10 percent per year. We will be lucky if it ends only in recession or stagflation, rather than a global depression.

The mess was created by the same apparat who bought into “modern monetary theory.” That silly university idea claimed prosperity would follow vastly expanding the money supply, keeping interest rates at de facto zero levels, running huge annual deficits, piling up unsustainable national debt, and subsidizing workers to stay home.

Natural gas and oil costs are now soaring to unsustainable levels—and to the point where the middle class simply will not be able to travel, keep warm in winter, or cool in summer.

Both in Europe and the United States left-wing governments deliberately curbed drilling and non-Russian pipelines. They shut down nuclear power plants and subsidized costly, inefficient solar and wind projects. They ended up not with utopia, but with fuel shortages, high prices, and energy dependency on the world’s most repressive regimes.

The woke revolution in the West was supposed to teach us that the “white male”-dominated Western world is toxic. Its origins, ascendence, and current leisure and affluence were supposedly due only to systemic exploitation, racism, and sexism.

Elites introduced cancel culture, doxxing, deplatforming, and social ostracism to shame these supposed exploiters and to destroy their lives and careers.

Few asked how a supposedly noxious West of some 2,500 years duration became the number one destination of millions of global non-Western migrants and offered the greatest degree of global prosperity and freedom for its citizens.

So a reset reckoning is coming—in reaction to the “new orders” championed by Biden and the Davos set.

In the November 2022 midterms, we are likely to see a historic “No!” to the orthodox left-wing agenda that has resulted in unsustainable inflation, unaffordable energy, war, and humiliation abroad, spiraling crime, racial hostility—as well as arrogant defiance from those who deliberately enacted these disastrous policies.

What will replace it is a return to what until recently had worked.

Closed and secure borders with only legal and measured immigration will return. Americans will demand tough police enforcement and deterrent sentencing, and a return to integration and the primacy of individual character rather than separatist fixations on the “color of our skin.”

The public will continue to tune out of the partisan and mediocre “mainstream” media. We will see greater increased production of oil and natural gas to transition us slowly to a wider variety of energy, strong national defense, and deterrent foreign policies.

The prophets of the new world order sowed the wind and they will soon reap the whirlwind of an angry public worn out by elite incompetence, arrogance, and ignorance.