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American consumers piled on more debt in October as inflation continues to squeeze their pocketbooks. Consumer debt grew by $16.9 billion, an annual increase of 4.6% (seasonally adjusted), according to the latest data released by the Federal Reserve. That raised total consumer debt to over $4.38 trillion.
Global ETF gold holdings increased in November for the first time since this summer. Gold-backed ETFs saw net inflows of 13.6 tons last month. Total holdings rebounded from year-to-date lows to 3,578 tons. According to the World Gold Council, investment demand for larger gold ETFs returned with decades-high inflation and heightened market volatility.
The stock market rallied early this week with receding worry about the omicron variant, but the specter of Federal Reserve monetary policy tightening remains. In his podcast, Peter Schiff talked about the anticipation of the Fed’s fight against inflation and explained why it’s a fight the central bank can’t win.
The October trade deficit fell but the drop was primarily due to a data anomaly. October 2021 charted a total trade deficit of -$67.1 billion. It was the lowest trade deficit since April 2021. Month-on-month, the trade deficit fell 17% from the record set in September.
Similar to August and September, the total national debt has not increased due to the current debt ceiling that’s in place. Similar to August, the Treasury has raided public retirement accounts to continue funding government spending (light green bar below). Looking at the bigger picture, Covid has forever shifted the landscape of US Debt.
The federal government lacks any legitimate constitutional authority to establish welfare programs for the poor. Not only that, the federal welfare system fails in its promise to “help the poor” out of poverty.
Inflation is running rampant. At first, the powers that be tried to convince us it wasn’t a problem because it was just a temporary phenomenon caused by coronavirus. (As if a virus could cause the money supply to increase.) But now, the transitory inflation narrative is dead. Jerome Powell recently admitted that it’s time to […]
Over the last several years, we’ve seen strong central bank gold-buying. The surge in gold purchases has primarily been driven by a handful of consistent players. But over the last several months, we’ve seen several new countries enter the market. The most recent is Ireland.
That was one weird jobs report. The labor department released the November employment data on Friday. The numbers simply don’t make any sense. As one chief investment officer put it, “One of the weirdest reports I have ever seen.” One thing seems pretty certain. The labor market has not recovered, no matter how the powers […]
Looking at the data, it appears hedge funds are currently driving price action in the gold market Please note: the COTs report was published 12/3/2021 for the period ending 11/30/2021. “Managed Money” and “Hedge Funds” are used interchangeably.
