The US Federal Reserve: A Rich History of Financial Folly

Ehow.com relates a piece of history in that “Since the creation of the Federal Reserve in 1913, the money supply had increased 240 percent from 1913 to 1920, because of a relaxed gold standard, and prices had risen by an identical amount.”

Gaahhh! Prices rising 240%! In seven years, the money supply increased 240%, meaning it more than doubled, as did prices! No wonder they had a recession!

[Read more...]

A World of Deficit Spending Without Any Changes

Junior Mogambo Ranger (JMR) Terry L. sent me the essay “Fiscal Armageddon in the USA” by C. Banesh, who reminds us that “Sometime between now and 2012 the US debt will equal the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the total market value of all the goods and services in our economy for an entire year.”

[Read more...]

Beware the Demon of Inflation

The 5-Minute Forecast came to me in an email with the subject line reading “5-Minute Forecast – Everybody Panic.”

Naturally, as a guy who is always on the verge of panic because of the fact that all the monstrously excessive amounts of money that the Federal Reserve is creating will cause inflation in prices, this affected me greatly.

[Read more...]

When the Government Should Do Nothing

Gary North in his Reality Check newsletter penned the essay “Gold vs. Guns and Badges,” wherein he notes that “There are only two conceptual options in monetary theory: a full gold coin standard in which the citizens hold the golden hammers or a system of economic planning in which elite members of the planning bureaucracy hold the digital hammers. There is no third choice.”

[Read more...]

Fractional Reserve Banking Gone Amok

From Chartoftheday.com we get the Quote of the Day, which is from the legendary Will Rogers, who cleverly said, “The fellow that can only see a week ahead is always the popular fellow, for he is looking with the crowd. But the one that can see years ahead, he has a telescope but he can’t make anybody believe that he has it.”

[Read more...]

Buying Silver and Avoiding the Sharks

I keep pounding, pounding, pounding the table that silver is the biggest bargain out there, for, at last count, a jillion reasons, and that anybody who does not buy silver Right Freaking Now (RFN) is making the mistake of a lifetime, and the family is all, like, “Will you please stop pounding the table? It is irritating and is making things spill, aside from the fact that we don’t have any money with which to buy silver, and you know that!” which devolved into a lengthy discussion about who among them was the most irritated with me and everything I say or do.

[Read more...]

Buying Silver to Combat the Vampire Craze

Dominic Frisby of Money Morning newsletter quotes Nick Laird of Sharelynx as saying that the situation in silver is such that “since 1950, almost 925,000 tonnes have gone into demand with 570,000 tonnes of this having come from production. This leaves a shortfall of 350,000 tonnes, which has come from central bank sales, stockpiles and scrap. This deficit equals approximately 16 years of production.”

[Read more...]

Salivating at the Upside Potential of the Gold Market

Not long ago, as I recall, a pension fund in some foreign country, one of those Scandinavian ones I think, was ordered to invest no more than about 3% of its custody assets in gold, meaning that the fund had too much gold, and to sell part of its gold holdings in order to comply.

Personally, I think that the 4,500-year historical record shows that being 100% invested solely in gold over the long-term is almost always a Very, Very Good Idea (VVGI), while the 4,500-year record of being solely invested in stocks, bonds and housing over the long-term is almost always a Very, Very Bad Idea (VVBI).

[Read more...]

“Buy Gold” Recommendation Reaches China

GoldSeek.com had the Reuters news report with the headline “China Adviser Says Beijing Should Buy More Gold.”

Now, of course, we are all saying, “This is exactly what The Incomparable Mogambo (TIM) has been advising the Chinese to do, and what everyone should do, too, and buy silver, too!” which rhymes, so you know that it must be true, which also rhymes, although, in describing it, it doesn’t, sort of like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle for no particular reason, which just shows how Very Freaked Out (VFO) I am by the satanic Federal Reserve continuing to create trillions of dollars even as inflation in food and energy prices is soaring.

[Read more...]