Kerry Lutz's--Financial Survival Network

Gordon T. Long and Charles Hugh Smith recently did a blockbuster presentation on the evolution of Crony Capitalism in America. They traced its route causes and the damage that is currently being inflicted upon the country and the population from it. Today Gordon and I dicussed possible strategies that individuals can to take avoid the negative effects of Crony Capitalism and thrive nonetheless. The goal is simple and with a little bit of work anyone can do it. 

Bix Weir joined us today for a look at what's happening now and what's going to happen next. It's all getting very interesting. While gold and silver prices get hammered, there's no supply to be had. Bitcoin is also getting hammered, down to the low $400's, and the dollar keeps going up. Bix is convinced that it's all going to end soon and with a bang, not a whimper. We'll know a lot more soon. 

Nile Nickel is an expert at using Linkedin to expand your business. He's got a free 5 point report to help you get your message out and to help your business thrive. We only had time to discuss a few of them, but they are quite common sense and powerful. And best of all they're free. You should connect with him today. 

We spoke with Sprott Global's Jason Stevens. He's not at all discouraged by the recent price action in gold and silver. He expects to see the gold price stay in the $1250 to $1400 range for a while. But the miners have already learned to exist and thrive in this environment and when the price eventually increases the miners will really profit. There's still plenty of bargains and now is a good time to be looking closer at them. 

Andy Ofiesh is a technologist at Armory Technologies. They produce a Bitcoin wallet but are working on features that are aimed at bringing the cryptocurrency to a whole new level. Their multiple signature feature can require escrow agents to sign off on transactions to allow funds transfers to take place. This is really cutting edge. Based on our discussion, you can see that Bitcoin is rapidly evolving and we're only at the very beginning. 

Heather Wagenhals was back on with us discussing the new, or not so new, Verizon 28 scam. That's where a robocall informs you that because you're such a wonderfull Verizon customer, you're entitled to get $30 back, just go to the Verizon28 website. Give them your account information and then you'll get the credit applied to your next bill, except that the instead of the credit, you'll get a nice $300 charge. Evidently, it's been going on for quite some time and Verizon hasn't been doing much, if anything about it. Be on the look for this and a whole lot more. 

Peter Grandich says that everyone is down on gold and this could be the final down leg down. While timing is always tricky, the near universal bearish sentiment could be the best indicator that the triple bottom will be the final bottom for the yellow metal. While retail investment demand for the gold is near non-existent, there's still plenty of jewelry demand and it might not take much to get it going higher again. Remember, the black swans are still circling. 

There's an emerging trading block-the BRICS-that could and probably will eventually challenge the Dollar's primacy. When is the question? Right now the world's economic system is truly on the edge. If the Dollar's reserve currency status gets upended now, will it cause global chaos, especially if the United States fights back? And will we wind up with chaos anyway due to the insane actions of the world's central banks? John and I discuss these questions and more on today's dicussion. 

Manipulation Mondays with Andrew Hoffman:

Secession -

                - 1.8 million Catalonians rallied Friday for secession, 25% of Spanish

                  tax revnues

                -Majority of Venetians favor secession, 10% of Italian GDP

                -Scotland 50% odds of "yes" vote Wednesday, would destabilize all of

                  Europe (and Scotland would own 90% of North Sea oil revenues)

 Articles:  "SECESSIONIST MOVEMENTS GAINING MOMENTUM"; "WEST TO EAST, GLOBAL ECONOMIC COLLAPSE"; "COMMODITY CRASH"

Collapsing global economy

-IMF reduced global GDP forecast, World Bank warned of global jobs crisis

-China, worst GDP growth since 2008, worst capex growth since 2001, negative yoy electricity output

-Japan, all economic data dramatically revised downward last week, Abenomics to end in April with Japanese economy/inflation (i.e., the "Misery Index") at multi-decade lows-

-Europe - QE set to start next month and NIRP expanding to the point it may catalyze bank runs (i.e., backdoor bail-ins)

- Article - "WE ARE AT THE LOWER BOUND"

-"Strengthening dollar" fallacy, as emerging market - and ALL - currencies plummeting, per the expansion of the "FINAL CURRENCY WAR" circa 2011-12 that keeps gaining momentum.

Articles: "THE LOWEST INFLATION IN FIVE YEARS"; "THE SINGLE MOST PRECIOUS METALS BULLISH FACTOR"; "IF A NUCLEAR BOMB DESTROYED EUROPE…" (publishing today)

-COMEX manipulation, as silver open interest explodes despite plunging prices - Harvey Organ believes Chinese no longer able to source metal, end is nigh

-Russian sanctions, upcoming blowback (especially with Ruble at all-time low)

-FOMC meeting Wednesday, ECB TLTRO uptake announcement Wednesday, Scottish vote Thursday

Nick wrote his book  $10,000 Gold: Why Gold’s Inevitable Rise Is the Investor’s Safe Haven. He's still sticking with his prediction, in spite of the recent slam down of gold and silver. He sees it as nothing more than manipulation. The reasons for his prediction are still happening. Unless the US discovers fiscal sanity tomorrow, a highly unlikely event, the future is quite certain, the dollar is headed for the dustbin of history. Unfortunately, people don't like to face the facts, even when they're facing them squarely in the face. Nick still believes that bullion is your ultimate savior. 

David Barnett is the master of local investing. Why put your money into companies you have little or no control over, when you could be helping people in your local community to expand their businesses and to improve the local economy. And you'll be realizing much higher returns in the process. David is starting a movement. He didn't know it when he made his first loan, but he's helping to change the world. 

Reid M. Hart is an experienced attorney practicing criminal law in Florida, and the answer to the abused cliche is yes, a grand jury could indict a ham sandwich, and that's no baloney. However, recently in a much publicized case, one chose not to. Two Brown University football players were accused of sexual assault and the case was presented to a grand jury, which surprise of all surprises, declined to indict. However, they were still booted out of Brown University with no due process.  

We also talked about the abuses that routinely take place by the police in the speedtrap capitol of the United States, Waldo Florida. Recent disclosures have proven that this town is little more than a ticket mill, where thousands of drivers are wrongly nailed for speeding each year. The State's known about it for decades but chose to do nothing, until now. 

Gary Christenson has been following Gold for a long time. He's given up trying to make sense of the day to day gyrations. Rather he began looking for a neutral way to value it and struck upon using total US debt outstanding. Based upon this measure, gold prices are due for a large increase. When isn't so important. Gary's content to just hold on and wait for the inevitable.

Craig Lack is a best selling author and widely acknowledged expert on Obamacare and health insurance benefits. If there's a silver lining to this cloud, Craig has found it. Under the law, it is now possible to incentivize healthy behavior and pass on the savings that result from it. Therefore, if you can get your employees to live a healthier lifestyle and keep their premiums down, you can share the savings. There's other ways to save and avoid the mandates as well, you just have to know where to look, which Craig explains. 

Just when it looked like the fun was about to begin, Detroit's noisiest and perhaps most obnoxious creditor, bond insurer Syncora agreed to a settlement. It's clearly a case of the squeeky wheel getting the oil. Initally they were slated to lose $400 million, most of it going to keep the insolvent Detroit pension fund paying out to retirees. Now, they will lose much less and the bankruptcy will move ahead much faster, everybody's a winner, right? 

The famous Lion's Share slot machine at Vegas's MGM Grand Casino finally paid off after 20 years. The lucky winners took down $2.4 million dollars and will get to keep the lucky machine. If only it had paid off at the Liberty Mastermind Symposium, yours truly would not be writing this column now. 

More of the day's latest news discussed herein. 

Gerard Francis Lameiro Ph.D. is an author, philosopher, economist, and engineer. His latest book is Renewing America andIts Heritage of Freedom. Dr. Lameiro believes that it's not too late to save the country from the progressives who are trying to turn it into a socialist haven. It's up to us all to take action to save it and make it better than it's ever been before. 

Rituparna Basu of the Ayn Rand Institute joined us today. There's a new breakthrough treatment for Hepatitis C called Sovaldi. Unfortunately, it costs $1000 per pill. It's so costly that the government and insurance companies are rebelling against the Gilead Pharmaceuticals, the developer. Should everyone in society have access to a new treatment, regardless of the cost? Should the government institute price controls to that end? Will it destroy innovation as a result? These types of questions will become more common as these types of drugs hit the market in the future, so the issues must be addressed now rather than later. We need policies that insure innovation continues while allowing the widest access possible. 

Tom Cloud is our new precious metals sponsor. He's well qualified, having been in the business for 38 years. He's also an expert in diamonds. Right now, colored stones is where the action is at, especially intense pink and intense blue. But Tom also sees value in yellow diamonds as well. The Chinese are stocking up on them. Tom's offering free shipping and insurance to all new FSN listeners. Give him a call and find out at 800-247-2812. 

Danielle's recent article shows an alarming chart by John Hussman. It could be entitled Anatomy of a Bubble. No one knows they're in a bubble until after the bubble pops. Why is that? Perhaps because it's so difficult to keep one's perspective when the double digit gains are piling up. In any event, the chart is quite alarming and you should be alarmed too. 

Next, we discussed Elizabeth Warren's ceaseless efforts to impose accountability upon the financial system. Unfortunately, it's a lonely battle. And finally, Payday Loans, a business that shouldn't be allowed to exist. You'll be amazed who financed these entities. 

School nutrition experts in Nebraska are struggling to comply with new federal snack regulations championed by First Lady Michelle Obama.

“I think we’ve gone too far, too fast,” Diane Zipay, director of nutritional services for the Westside School District told KIETV.com. “And I don’t think it’s a real-world environment. We might have changed the school but we haven’t changed the child or our world.”

The federal snack rules take effect this year for school districts across the country that participate in the federal free and reduced lunch program. They restrict snack foods sold at schools to those with at least 50 percent whole grain, with low sugar, fat and sodium content. Each snack must also come in under 200 calories, according to the news site.

Dave Bego has chronicled his epic battle against forced unionization of his workforce. There's talk now of making it into a movie. The real issue is one of freedom; the worker's choice of whether to join a union in the first place. They tried every trick in the book to force Dave to relent to the union, yet he refused and he won.

John recently wrote, The folks at Gresham’s Law just published a nifty interactive chart of real (i.e., inflation-adjusted) interest rates since the 1960s that explains a lot about today’s world.

To make sense of this, let’s start with a a little background: Interest rates are the rental cost of money, but to figure out the true cost you have to adjust the nominal (or numerical) interest rate for inflation, which is the rate at which the currency being borrowed is falling in value.

If the nominal interest rate is higher than inflation, then the real interest rate is positive. If the real rate is both positive and high, that’s a signal that money is expensive and that one is better off being a lender (to reap those high returns) than a borrower (who has to pay the high true cost of money). The opposite is true for negative real rates, where the nominal cost of money is lower than the rate at which the currency is being depreciated. In this case a borrower actually gets paid to borrow because the true cost of the loan falls as the currency loses value. So negative real rates tell market participants to borrow as much as possible.

Global economic collapse            

                -European recession - record debt, near record unemployment, historic plunge in German investor sentiment;

                -France in outright collapse, Italy triple-dip recession, Spanish banks as insolvent as Portugal;

                -UK could be thrown into chaos if 9/18 Scottish independence referendum a yes - and now polling that way;

                -Japan massive economic data negative revisions this weekend

                -China housing bubble burst accelerates, which is why the PBOCs PSL, or pledged supplementary lending, QE program commenced last month, following the Yuan devaluation earlier this year

                -essentially all nations in or near contraction

                                -article references last week:  "West to East, Economic Collapse"; "European Economic Collapse, in Simple Math"

ECB        - rate cuts (extended NIRP)

                - $1 trillion QE announced, starting October

                - article references:  "Thursday's ECB meeting could destroy Europe, if Ukraine doesn't first

NFP jobs             

                - 142,000 vs. expected 230,000

                - 102, 000 birth/death jobs

                - 0 manufacturing jobs

                - 35 year low labor participation rate

                - a third of all jobs now "temp"

                - completely refutes "island of lies" U.S. economic data like diffusion indices and weekly jobless claims

                - Stockman article "why bubblevision misses epic failure in labor market"

                -just two months ago, Yellen complained of "significant underutilization of labor resources"; and two weeks ago, dedicated here Jackson Hole speech to addressing such fears

                -article references:  "significant underutilization of labor resources"; "jackson black hole"; "what jy and md really said"

"Rising dollar"

                -new meme of U.S. QE ending and Japan/Europe accelerating, thus creating a "strong dollar" and weaker PM demand

                 -ridiculous in so many aspects, lots to speak of

                 -only against items of real value is "the dollar" to be measured, not other fiat trash

                 -900 million people in Japan/Europe, compared to 300 million in U.S. - sounds like net more PM buying to me

Manipulation Monday

                -bombshell that CME boasting "governments" and "central banks" as customers, and offering volume discounts to them for overnight PM futures "trading"

One area where you can save a bundle is auto maintenance. Today's cars are as complicated as the passenger jets of yesterday. But Pam is 4th gen auto expert and she knows every trick in the book for keeping your car running right for hundreds of thousands of miles. When that check engine light goes on, ignorance can cost you thousands, but if you listen to Pam, it doesn't have to. She's written books and shows you how it's done.  

George Matheis, Jr., is an a leading self-defense expert. He's taught thousand how to stay out of trouble and how to get out of trouble once there. He's trained SWAT officer too. Now he tells you what to do when you wind up in a Ferguson type situation. Valuable information in this day and age. Because you never know when it's going to happen to you!