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The Bank of Japan (BoJ) will conclude its final policy meeting of 2017 at some point on Thursday. The BoJ is expected to leave its monetary policy settings unchanged as it has done for the entirety of 2017, which would see the Bank maintain its QQE with Yield Curve Control (YCC) and a 10-year yield target of around 0% and leave its benchmark interest rate at -0.10%.

As usual, there is no exact timing for the decision, and it could be announced any time after the start of the Tokyo lunch break at 0230GMT/2130ET/1030HKT.

Today’s announcement could be more eventful than usual, with focus on the accompanying statement following reports which have suggested that there could be a tweak in the central bank’s language due to dovish dissent. Policy board member Goushi Kataoka has proven to be more dovish than his peers since he joined the board in July 2017, holding the view that the currently monetary policy stance is insufficient as it will not push inflation up to 2% during FY 2019.

Elsewhere, the commentary from other BoJ officials continues to show support for the Bank’s ultra-loose stance. Governor Haruhiko Kuroda has reiterated that Japan remains far away from its 2% price target and that the BoJ will persistently continue with its powerful monetary easing. Furthermore, BoJ’s Amamiya also advocated the need to persistently continue with the current monetary easing, while board member Masai noted the importance of showing a determination to create stable prices, while she also highlighted that YCC is powerfully supporting the economy.

Recent data releases have been varied which points to no sudden need for any near-term policy changes. Headline CPI stood at 0.2% Y/Y in November, while the core metric came in at 0.8% Y/Y, still well short of the BoJ’s 2.0% target.

Conversely, economic growth figures have been more encouraging after a recent stellar upward revision for the Q3 annualized GDP reading to 2.5% vs. Exp. 1.5% (Prev. 1.4%), while the latest Tankan survey was somewhat inconclusive, as the large manufacturers index came in better than expected, although the outlook and capex readings disappointed.

Any significant changes to the board’s rhetoric to conform with the known reflationist Kataoka could potentially underpin the USD/JPY cross and domestic indices, while the reverse may be true if a dovish tweak fails to materialise or if there are any significant statements regarding increasing costs of pro-longed ultra-loose policy (a topic which sources have suggested officials are becoming more vocal about).

Looking ahead to 2018, the main focus will be on whether Kuroda is reappointed as Governor when his term ends in April (which is what the consensus currently expects). However, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has kept his cards close to his chest so far, and although other touted potential candidates, including two of Abe’s most trusted advisors, Etsuro Honda and Takatoshi Ito, have both shown their dovish leanings, anything other than Kuroda’s reappointment could be viewed as somewhat of a disappointment given the current Governor’s history of implementing unprecedented policy measures.

What The Bank Desks Are Saying

Barclays: We expect policy to remain intact and will focus on BoJ Governor Kuroda’s handling of any questions around the prospect of normalization, as well as any easing proposals by Policy Board member Kataoka.

Daiwa: Of course, consistent with the Tankan price indices, inflation remains well below target and has been rising only very gradually. In November, the BoJ’s forecast core measure (excluding fresh food) edged up to 0.8%Y/Y and its preferred core measure (which also excludes energy prices) was unchanged at 0.2%Y/Y. So, despite the unbroken above-trend economic expansion and highly favourable business conditions, when the BoJ Policy Board meets in the coming week, it will not want to reduce overall monetary accommodation, and we expect it to retain its existing main policy settings i.e. the -0.1% interest rate on banks’ marginal excess reserves and the pledge to keep 10Y JGB yields ‘at around zero per cent’.

HSBC: The very modest acceleration in income gains remains far short of what is required for the Bank of Japan (BoJ) to reach its price stability target of 2%. Consequently, the BoJ is likely to maintain its extremely easy monetary policy at the upcoming policy meeting, but the key focus is whether the Bank will give any hint of a premature exit from its commitment. We think it is unlikely as any pullback will dampen medium-term inflation expectations and result in a notable correction in financial market instruments, including the value of the yen.

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Yesterday, we published a report about an incident involving South Korea, Japan and China that nearly escalated into a full-blown skirmish, as Japan and South Korea were forced to order intercepts of Chinese military aircraft as a squadron of fighters and bombers flew over the waters between South Korea and Japan – an area that has historically been off limits to Chinese aircraft. It wasn't until after the Chinese aircraft had dispersed that Chinese military commanders disclosed that the intrusion was part of a "military exercise."

When China’s South Korean counterparts called to ask why they hadn’t been given advanced warning of the drills, the Chinese authority in charge reportedly responded that the element of surprise was part of the drill.

In recent months, Beijing has insisted that it needs to prepare its military in the event of an armed conflict on the Korean peninsula – an excuse for bulking up its military presence at an uncomfortably close proximity to its geopolitical archrival, Japan.

In response, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is accelerating Japan's militarization as the country inches closer to abandoning its post-WWII policy of pacifism. The latest example of this shift was highlighted by the Wall Street Journal in a report published Wednesday about Japan's push to build a military installation equipped with antiaircraft and antiship weapons on the island of Ishigaki, a Japanese holding situated near Taiwan, and just miles away from a Chinese waters.

Of course, Japan is facing a more immediate threat in North Korea – which has twice fired intermediate-range ballistic missiles over the Japanese island of Hokkaido. But as both powers pose increasingly immediate threats to Japanese security, Japan is being forced to swiftly build up its military deterrants as the possibiilty of an armed conflict in the region becomes increasingly less remote.

Case in point, Abe is expected later this week to approve another boost in military spending – something that would've been unthinkable just a decade ago.

As China becomes more powerful and assertive and North Korea builds up its nuclear arsenal, Japan is rethinking its approach to defense and moving away from the policies of strict pacifism it has followed since its defeat in World War II.

 

On Friday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s cabinet is set to approve an increase of around 2.5% in annual military spending, including funds for the new bases on the southern islands, as well as the country’s first cruise missiles and a new ballistic-missile defense shield.

 

Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera said the cruise missiles are intended to protect the islands from invasion

 

Defense budgets have been growing since 2013, with Japan, one of the U.S.’s most important allies, buying advanced fighter jets, boosting surveillance capabilities and training a new amphibious troop unit.

With explicit support of Washington, Japan has slowly building what WSJ described as “one of the world’s most capable armed forces."

To be sure, the country still spends around half of that spent by China and one-third of the US in terms of GDP.

But the notion that Japan must turn away from post-WWII pacifism is gaining traction as President Trump pursues his "America First" foreign policy. Early this year, Trump famously suggested that Japan and South Korea should obtain nuclear weapons – an extemporaneous statement that was widely criticized by national security hawks. But even before Trump, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had been slowly building up Japan’s military as he guided the country away from the pacifist stance it had maintained for more than 60 years.

Per WSJ, Ishigaki and neighboring islands are part of what China’s military calls the “first island chain,” a series of archipelagoes around China’s perimeter stretching from Russia’s Kurils to the South China Sea, where Beijing seeks naval dominance.

Authorities on Ishigaki have jurisdiction over a nearby group of tiny, uninhabited islands that Japan calls the Senkakus. They are also claimed by China and Taiwan.

In recent years China has sent progressively larger coast guard ships, some of them armed, to circle the islands in a display of military dominance as it hopes to assert its control over all contested islands in the South and East China seas. A fleet of 10 Japanese coast guard ships based in Ishigaki regularly plays cat-and-mouse with the Chinese vessels.

Rear Adm. Atsushi Tohyama, commander of the Ishigaki coast guard base, said Japanese ships make contact with Chinese boats by radio to avoid physical clashes. “The Chinese ships are getting bigger and more modern. In that sense, they are escalating the situation,” he said.

A spokesman for the Japanese army said it hopes to deploy 500 to 600 soldiers to Ishigaki to man the new missile installation once its completed.

But now that Chinese Premier Xi Jinping has effectively consolidated his power over the country, expect to see that number rise. Dominion over the Pacific is becoming an increasingly important military priority for the People's Liberation Army – not to mention a demonstration of intense national pride.

Despite Xi's cozy public relationship with Trump, many US military commanders agree with the assessment provided by White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon: China is a geopolitical foe of the US.

And no amount of public gladhanding will change that.

 

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At this point, it’s well known that Obama was willing to do just about anything to salvage his highly controversial “nuclear deal” with Tehran.  In fact, as we noted over the summer, ‘anything‘ included airlifting $1.7 billion dollars worth of euros, Swiss francs and other currencies, stacked on wooden pallets, to Tehran on an unmarked cargo plane (we covered it here: “White House Caught Secretly Airlifting $1.7 Billion US Taxpayer Cash To Tehran To Ensure Iran Nuclear Accord Success“). 

Now, according to a new report from Politico, ‘anything‘ might have also included enlisting the help of the Department of Justice and Treasury Department to quash a massive investigation, being led by the DEA, of a $200 million per month drug trafficking and money laundering scheme in the U.S. that was literally funding Hezbollah’s various terrorism campaigns around the globe.  Here’s more from the Washington Free Beacon:

U.S. drug enforcement agents who spoke to Politico about the matter accused the Obama administration of intentionally derailing an investigation into Hezbollah’s drug trafficking and money laundering efforts that began in 2008 under the Bush administration.

 

The investigation centered on Hezbollah and Iranian-backed militants who allegedly participated in the illicit drug network, which was subject to U.S. wiretaps and undercover operations.

 

Hezbollah is believed to have been laundering at least $200 million a month just in the United States, according to the report.

 

When U.S. authorities were ready to make the case against Hezbollah’s most senior leadership, Obama administration officials allegedly “threw an increasingly insurmountable series of roadblocks in its way,” according inside sources who spoke to Politico about the situation.

 

The Obama-led effort to block the investigation was “a policy decision, it was a systematic decision,” one source said. “They serially ripped apart this entire effort that was very well supported and resourced, and it was done from the top down.”

In light of these new revelations from Drug Enforcement Agents, Representative Ron DeSantis (R-FL), a member of the House Oversight Committee and chair of its National Security Subcommittee, said Congress is now taking steps to examine evidence that could implicate top former Obama officials, including National Security Council official Ben Rhodes, the architect of the former administration’s self-described pro-Iran “echo chamber.”

“I’ve long believed that the Obama administration could not have done any more to bend over backwards to appease the Iranian regime, yet news that the Obama administration killed the investigation into a billion dollar drug ring that lined the terrorist group Hezbollah’s pockets in order to save its coveted Iran deal may very well take the cake,” DeSantis said.

 

“Hezbollah is a brutal terrorist group with American blood on its hands and it would be unconscionable for American policy to deliberately empower such a nefarious group,” he said.

 

“Congress will be investigating this thoroughly and my National Security subcommittee will be particularly interested in how such a decision came about and whether it was driven by key Iran deal architects such as Ben Rhodes,” DeSantis said.

Representative Peter Roskam (R., Ill.), a chief national security voice in the House who fought against the nuclear accord, mimicked the views of DeSantis saying that Congress must investigate the Obama administration’s actions and work to increase pressure on Hezbollah.

“The report alleging the Obama Administration turned a blind eye and allowed Hezbollah to pump drugs into the United States to fund its terror campaigns in the Middle East is not surprising,” Roskam said. “Hampering the DEA’s investigation of Hezbollah would be emblematic of the previous administration’s fixation to strike a nuclear accord with Iran at any costs.”

 

“This blind eye imperiled our efforts to combat Iran and its proxies’ malign behavior and left us with a cash-flush Iran on the warpath across the Middle East with a nuclear program legitimized by the JCPOA,” Roskam said, using the acronym for the nuclear deal’s official name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. “Congress needs to investigate this report and do what the Obama Administration refused to do, severely increase pressure on Hezbollah and hold the terrorist group, and its benefactor Iran, accountable for their crimes.”

Of course, we’re sure it’s all another simple misunderstanding…Obama’s DOJ would never intentionally compromise an investigation to get what they want, right?

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Authored by John Stossel via Townhall.com,

People want politics to be simple. Left vs. right. Clinton vs. Trump. My side vs. your side. Elect the right guy, and things will be good!

The truth is more complicated.

Influential political philosophies created the mess we live with today, not just a political "left" and "right." There's socialism, conservatism, populism, progressivism, liberalism, scientism (eugenics), Marxism, totalitarianism, nationalism, fascism, Islamo-fascism, Nazism and probably others I missed.

But only two "isms" work well for ordinary people. More on them in a moment.

It's in the interests of politicians and activists to tell us society is divided into two armies, one good and one evil, with crushing defeat for one side just about to happen. When primitive parts of our brains see the world as "us vs. them," we're ready to fight each other.

We may not realize until it's too late that all those ideologies will reduce our freedom and increase the power of politicians.

Matt Kibbe, head of the group Free the People, calls them "the Deadly Isms" in a new series of online videos.

He urges people to stop wasting time worrying about which "ism" is on the left or right and worry more about how all threaten individual liberty.

Stalin was not the opposite of Hitler. Both were mass murderers who censored the press, seized control of industries and murdered innocent people. We don't benefit by choosing between communism and Nazism, or between the milder forms of them that still find adherents today: socialism and fascism.

Whether government gives you orders in the name of the working class or a superior race, it still takes away your right to do as you please.

On the other hand, there is an ideology that does leave us mostly free to do what we please. John Locke called it liberalism, saying that: "The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man."

We need some government to do some things — keep the peace, for example — but otherwise, government should mostly leave us alone.

Unfortunately, today's liberals stole Locke's word. Now liberalism means regulating most every detail of individual behavior and dividing people into grievance groups that use government to take each other's money and freedom.

Conservatism claims to love freedom, but its advocates don't mind government starting wars and crushing civil liberties of unpopular groups like drug users, immigrants, gamblers, sex workers and pornographers.

Today, both liberalism and conservatism are guilty of encouraging another ism: corporatism. That's what we get when government doles out special privileges to corporations and people who have more lawyers and lobbyists than you do.

A genuine free market rewards entrepreneurs who serve customers well. A government that hands out farm subsidies, wind-farm tax credits, mortgage deductions, etc., skews the economy in favor of those who are already rich. That's corporatism, or crony capitalism, or "crapitalism," and that's basically what we've got in America now.

Donald Trump practiced crapitalism. That's why cronies like Bill and Hillary Clinton attended his wedding. I don't blame Trump. When government has its fingers all over the economy, developers are smart to get cozy with the political class.

But when Trump ran for president, he didn't call himself a crony capitalist; he said he was a "populist." Sometimes he called it "popularist."

Populists are angry at the establishment.

But populism offers no solution. It leads instead to people following the will of self-appointed leaders who say they share the mob's anger. Bernie Sanders is called a populist, too.

Trump complains about regulations one day (I cheer), but then he complains about free trade the next. He seems to go wherever his moods, and the public's shifting moods, suggest. The anger is constant, but individual liberty suffers.

The only ism that doesn't threaten your freedom is liberalism (as originally defined) — libertarianism, as we call it now.

Let's take power from the other deadly isms and leave people free.

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If you look from a systemic perspective, Bitcoin has been nothing more than another electronic asset bubble, while not a QE tool explicitly used by the Fed – it has accomplished the same thing, but much faster.  What took decades and years for QE to do in other markets, Bitcoin did inside of a few months.  While it’s true that Bitcoin only goes up because US Dollars (USD) and other fiat currencies buys, the net effect is a near infinite velocity of money.  One subtle problem the Fed has dealt with perhaps more than inflation and others is Velocity of money, which is in steady decline since the credit crisis:

Basically, Velocity of money is how quickly money is ‘spent’ and moved around the economy.  Trillions of QE money on banks balance sheets is not helpful for the economy.  The Fed knows this, but is limited in its creativity.  Interestingly, if you look at the above chart when Velocity of money was in peak decline, it is about the time Bitcoin was introduced.  We have exposed how we believe anonymous forces inside the US Government are if not completely, somewhat responsible for the creation of Bitcoin, and in the very least participated in the design.  This isn’t a conspiracy theory, it is macro analysis.  Who was the most capable group who had the world’s best cryptographers, mathematicians, and huge budget? (NSA).  Who had an economic need for Bitcoin to solve the problem of Velocity of money (The Fed).  

We bring this up now because of the recent WAPO headlines about “Fedcoin”:

Cash has the distinct advantage of being anonymous. You can put cash under your mattress or in a vault, and no one knows about it except you. A national cryptocurrency would make it far more difficult for criminals to hoard money because all transactions would be recorded in the government ledger. If a transaction was deemed illegal, the parties to the transaction could be identified. This is also true with bitcoin, whose ledger is viewable to anyone. Despite the negative press about bitcoin being used for illegal transactions, bitcoin is not anonymous, and criminals who use it often do not understand that their transactions are being recorded.

There is another reason for governments to like the idea of a national cryptocurrency: strengthening the power of monetary policy to help manage the economy.

We published this insight in multiple articles months ago and in our book Splitting Bits: Understanding Bitcoin and the Blockchain.

The WAPO story is clearly setting the stage for something, as WAPO has become the goto CIA mouthpiece for PsyOps and other agencies in “Big Intel.” 

That’s it, now go spend your Bitcoin!

For a detailed breakdown how the financial system really works, checkout Splitting Pennies.

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Former FBI Assistant Director James Kallstrom spoke to FBN’s Stewart Varney to discuss recent bombshells concerning the FBI, whose top brass has been conducting a highly politicized witch-hunt of President Trump on behalf of the anti-Trump establishment, while protecting then-candidate Hillary Clinton from criminal charges related to her email investigation, Clinton Foundation involvement in pay-for-play schemes, including a farcical probe of the Uranium One scandal.

James Kallstrom, Fmr FBI Asst Director

When asked about morale at the FBI towards the end of the interview, Kallstrom dropped a very interesting breadcrumb: 

Varney: What’s morale like in the FBI now?

 

Kallstrom: It’s not good, but I think recent events that I’m aware of are going to improve that because there’s going to be actually something that’s going to happen, in my view.

 

Varney: You going to leave us on that?

 

Kallstrom: Well I think there’s a lot of patriots that have had it up to here with what’s going on, and they’re going to step forward and tell people what the shenanigans have been. How they shut down the Clinton Foundation investigation, how other things were done that are so anti-what the FBI and the United States and this country is about.

FOX BUSINESS: Ex-FBI Assistant Director James Kallstrom warns ‘patriots,’ will soon expose why the Clinton Foundation investigation was ‘shut down.’ http://pic.twitter.com/ubypqqbhRs

— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) December 20, 2017

Kallstrom also said he thinks there are people in the Justice department who may face obstruction charges: 

“Now we come to this focus on the fifth estate that I’ve talked about, that includes multiplicities of people. But now we know it also includes a bunch of sycophants in the FBI – they were part of the Comey team, apparently. And people in Justice also that I believe have exposure now for obstruction of justice.” 

Regarding Peter Strzok’s infamous “insurance” text to his mistress, FBI Attorney Lisa Page, he said “People tweet each other and they send text messages, but they don’t plan. The FBI is not in the business of planning to destroy a President of the United States,” adding “I think they were way above their capability. This guy thinks he’s the lone ranger, this Peter Strzok.” 

If that’s his thinking, and they were obviously in Andy’s office plotting some kind of thing. And I think that some kind of thing is what we’re seeing right now. And we’ve seen for the last, what, ever since he’s been elected we’ve seen this facade and this phony challenge to Trump about collusion and Russia, which nothing could be further from the truth. All the collusion is with the Democrats, and it’s very very depressing to be FBI agents. 99 percent are hard working patriotic guys and girls that come to work for the good of the country.

And you’ve got this cabal of people. You’ve got this deputy director (McCabe) who should have been out a long time ago for his actions. And then you’ve got Peter Strzok and who knows how many others. –James Kallstrom

Kallstrom then brought up a question that’s on a lot of minds currently; just what exactly is Jeff Sessions doing right now? 

“I think finally we’re going to get to the end of this, but the big mystery here is the Justice Department. What is the Justice Department doing? What is the Attorney General of the United States doing? You know, it’s too bad for Donald Trump… …It’s a mystery to me why he hasn’t called over to the Attorney General and told the AG “give the oversight committees the documents they’re looking for.” Why is the Trump Justice Department not complying with subpoenas?” 

Varney: I want to summarize this. I want to be very clear about it. I have said in my opinion there is a cabal active within the FBI and the Justice Department.

Kallstrom: Yes

Varney: Which hates trump, which protected Hillary Clinton and tried to bring down Donald Trump. And that is an extraordinary story of interference in an American presidential election.

Kallstrom: yes, yes, yes. It is. Without question that’s what it was. Just like the whole “so-called” Clinton investigation, it was phony from the beginning; No grand jury, giving witnesses immunity, putting all the subjects in one room at the same time. I mean it’s crazy. It’s nuts what they did. 

Watch the clip below: 

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Authored by Jeff Thomas via InternationalMan.com,

By now, many readers will have seen the popular American YouTube video by Mark Dice in which he stands on a city sidewalk and offers passers-by a free gift. They may choose between a 10-ounce silver bar or a large Hershey’s candy bar.

Each taker chooses the candy – most of them with no deliberation. The only taker who seems to hesitate at all soon decides on the candy, as “I don’t have any way to do anything with the silver.” (Behind them is a coin shop. Mister Dice offers to take the silver bar inside if she wishes, but she’s uninterested and takes the candy.)

A 10-ounce silver bar is presently valued at about $140, the Hershey’s bar at about $2.

(Editor’s Note: If you have not seen the video, please see below.)

Mister Dice doesn’t comment in the video as to what lesson might be learned from this, but an obvious one would be that Americans (or at least those who reside in his home town of San Diego, California) are prone to prefer instant gratification over something of substantially greater, but delayed value.

If this is his intent, he’s succeeded well in his light-hearted, but instructive video.

Since the 1950’s, much of the world has perceived Americans as being on “Easy Street,” and in recent decades, the U.S. government has fuelled American complacency through a consciousness of easy money and entitlement.

And so, Americans are often perceived by those outside the U.S. as being somewhat insulated, spoiled, naïve, and short-sighted. But, if this is true, Americans certainly aren’t alone. Much the same exists in Europe, Canada, and quite a few other countries that have, over recent decades, followed the American socio-economic model.

Trouble is, all that easy money and entitlement exists only as long as a source for the “freebies” exists. Unfortunately, the idea that freebies are free is inaccurate. Freebies of any description must be paid for by someone.

In business, freebies are sometimes provided as “loss-leaders” to attract more business. They therefore become a line item on the monthly balance sheet, a cost-of-doing-business expense. The business hopes to make the loss back through sales generated by the loss-leader.

But, when governments hand out freebies, no sales will be generated, so the loss will not be recovered. When governments hand out freebies, the cost is paid with tax revenues. And when taxes have been raised to the point that further increases would be difficult without inciting rebellion, governments generally rely on borrowing.

But, of course, borrowing, too, eventually reaches the point that it has become so great that it cannot be repaid. What then?

Invariably, economic collapse is the outcome. But, why should this be so? Well, when the tipping point is reached (as in jurisdictions like the EU and U.S., where more than 50% of the public are net recipients and the other 50% must pay for both themselves and the other 50%), there’s no turning back. Those who have been receiving the candy have been told that they’re entitled to it and now they believe it. They will not tolerate the suggestion that the freebies must end, even though no further tax can be reasonably levied; no further funds can be borrowed. Therefore, in every case, the result is systemic collapse, not a gradual tapering off.

For thousands of years, governments have sought to appease people with freebies. In ancient Rome, a dole of grain and free entertainment (bread and circuses) helped to usher in the decline of the empire. Like all great empires, it collapsed under a weight of debt and mismanagement.

Much of the world is presently at this tipping point. Governments continue to promise benefits that they know will soon come to an end. If history repeats, they will continue repeating this promise right up until the day when the candy stops being dished out.

They will then say that no one could have seen this coming.

Amongst the public who will be the victims, there will be three general groups. First will be the Takers, those who have been the recipients who depended upon the freebies the most. They will be the hardest hit, as not only will they lose the freebies, they will have neither the skills nor the imagination to become self-reliant overnight.

The second group will be the Payers, those whose tax dollars paid for the freebies. They will be hard hit, as the system in which they live and operate has broken down, although they will fare better than the Takers. They will have the skills and imagination to rebuild their lives (having previously been productive enough to pay for themselves and others.)

Third will be the Preparers, those who envisioned the inevitability of the collapse of the system. They most certainly will have the skills and imagination to rebuild their lives, but, additionally, they’ll have the means with which to rebuild quickly. They will be the very few who chose the silver bar over the candy and had the wisdom to store the silver in a jurisdiction where it was not likely to be appropriated by a dying empire.

Much of the world is now running out of candy. The latest version of Bread and Circuses is reaching its inevitable end.

Replaying the video, we observe Mister Dice offering chocolate or silver. Each Taker looks at him incredulously, then makes the obvious choice, the candy. Each of them gives him a smile. Each is pleased to walk away with the chocolate, but, likely as not, each will have consumed the bar before the day is out and the benefit of the freebie will be short-lived.

After giving out eight bars, Mister Dice is all out of chocolate and he presumably goes home. He has no candy, but he does have 10 ounces of silver. Perhaps he owns other silver bars as well, stored in a safer jurisdiction.

Each of us has the opportunity to make a choice as to whether we wish to be Takers, Payers, or Preparers. The choice we make may define our future.

*  *  *

The U.S. government’s bad financial decisions and massive debt levels will cause another financial crisis sooner rather than later.

Like most governments that get into financial trouble, we think American politicians will keep choosing the easy option…money printing on a massive scale.

This has tremendous implications for your financial security. These politicians are playing with fire and inviting a currency catastrophe.

This is a big reason why we think everyone should own some physical gold and silver. Precious metals are the ultimate form of wealth insurance. They have preserved wealth through every kind of crisis imaginable. They will preserve wealth during the next crisis, too.

But, if you want to be truly “crisis-proof”, there is more to do…

Most people have no idea what really happens when a currency collapses, let alone how to prepare…

How will you protect your savings in the event of a currency crisis? This just-released video will show you exactly how. Click here to watch it now.

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Illinois is drowning under a mountain of debt, unpaid bills and underfunded pension liabilities and it’s largest city, Chicago, is suffering from a staggering outbreak of violent crime not seen since gang wars engulfed major cities from LA to New York in the mid-90’s.  Here is just a small taste of some of our posts on Illinois’ challenges:

• Illinois Pension Funding Ratio Sinks To 37.6% As Unfunded Liabilities Surge To $130 Billion
• Illinois Unpaid Vendor Backlog Hits A New Record At Over $16 Billion
• The State Of Illinois Is “Past The Point Of No Return”
• “What The Hell Is Going On In Chicago” And Other Highlights From Trump’s Speech To FBI Grads

Given that, it’s hardly surprising that the Prairie State lost a net 33,700 residents in fiscal year 2017, according to the Census Bureau.  Also not surprising is the fact that the mass exodus from Illinois was the largest of any state in the country with lower taxed, lower cost of living states like Texas and Florida posting the biggest gains. 

Of course, the net population loss masks the true gross outflow of Illinois residents as it doesn’t account for natural births/deaths. Assuming that Illinois has the same natural population growth as the U.S. as a whole (0.7%) implies that the state lost a staggering ~125,000 residents in aggregate, or roughly 1 man/woman/child every 4.3 minutes.

Meanwhile, adding insult to injury, the domestic migration out of Illinois was enough to push the state down one notch on the state population ranking tables to just below Pennsylvania. Per Illinois Policy:

Of course, this is all terrible news for Illinois retirees whose pension obligations continue to grow every year and currently stand at nearly $130 billion…

While we could be wrong, the last we checked folks were no longer on the hook to pay Illinois taxes after making the decision to move to another state.  Meanwhile, efforts to offset the lost tax revenue will only result in an acceleration of population declines in the future…

Conclusion: Sorry, Illinois, but your ponzi scheme is slowly coming unraveled.

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Today, mankind stands at a crossroads, and as GoldSilver.com's Mike Maloney explains, the path that humanity chooses may have a greater impact on our freedom and prosperity than any event in history.

In 2008 a new technology was introduced that is so important that its destiny, and the destiny of mankind are inextricably linked.

It is so powerful that if captured and controlled, it could enslave all of humanity. But if allowed to remain free and flourish – it could foster unimaginable levels of peace and prosperity.

It has the potential to replace many functions of Wall Street and even of government, as a tool to empower individuals. In the latest episode In the latest episode of Hidden Secrets of Money, Mike Maloney examines this technology and its incredible potential.

Whether you believe in the potential or not, we think Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies have proven at a minimum that they must be taken seriously. All investors would be wise to ensure they understand the phenomenon.

It has the power to replace all financial systems globally, to supplant ninety percent of Wall St, and to provide some functions of government.

 

It has no agenda.

 

It's always fair and impartial.

 

It can not be manipulated, subverted, corrupted or cheated.

 

And – it inverts the power structure and places control of one's destiny in the hands of the individual.

In the future, when we look back at the 2.6 million-year timeline of human development and the major turning points that led to modern civilization – the creation of farming, the domestication of animals, the invention of the wheel, the harnessing of electricity and the splitting of the atom – the sixty year development of computers, the internet and this new technology will be looked upon as a single event…a turning point that will change the course of human history.

It's called Full Consensus Distibuted Ledger Technology, and so far its major use has been for cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin….but its potential goes far, far beyond that.

The Crypto Revolution: From Bitcoin to Hashgraph is our latest episode of Hidden Secrets of Money.

It’s about the evolution of cryptocurrencies and full consensus distributed ledger technology, and how they will change our world. I believe that this video is by far the easiest way for the average person to gain an understanding of what cryptocurrencies are and how they work, but more importantly, the immense power of full consensus distributed ledger technology and the impact it will have on our daily lives. I have an absolute passion for monetary history and economics, and I love teaching them. Cryptocurrencies are our future, and there is no escaping it… this is the way everything will be done from now on. But, we now stand at a crucial turning point in history. Full consensus ledgers such as Blockchain and Hashgraph have the power to enslave us, or free us… it all depends on how we choose to use them.

If we choose to support centralized versions issued by governments and the financial sector we will be granting them more control over our daily lives. Politicians and bureaucrats will be able raise taxes instantly, whenever they want, on every dollar you make as you make them, and every dollar you spend as you spend them. If they think the economy needs stimulating they'll be able to enforce huge negative interest rates, effectively punishing you for not spending everything you earn before you earn it. They'll be able to decide where you can go and where you can’t, what you can buy and what you can’t, and what you can do and whatever they decide you can’t do… and if they don't like you, they can just disconnect you from the monetary system.

So, will the monetary system become fully distributed and help to free mankind, or will it be centralized and enslave us?

The choice is in front of us right now, and our decisions will create our future. I believe that this will be a binary outcome, there is no middle ground, it will either be one future or the other. The question is, will it be the future we want? Or the future they want? I’m a precious metals dealer and one thing I’ve learned is that gold, silver, and now free market decentralized cryptocurrencies, represent freedom.

Because of this knowledge I started investing in crypto currencies long ago and also became one of the first precious metals dealers to accept bitcoin as payment for gold and silver.

I would really appreciate it if you could share this video with everyone you know. I think it’s very important that as many people as possible find out about the changes to the global monetary system that are happening right now… nothing will affect us more, and everyone’s future depends on it.

via http://ift.tt/2z5OsRx Tyler Durden

Authored by Steve H. Hanke of the Johns Hopkins University. Follow him on Twitter @Steve_Hanke.

The Grim Reaper has taken his scythe to the Venezuelan bolivar. The death of the bolivar is depicted in the following chart. A bolivar is worth less, and with its collapse, Venezuela is witnessing today the world’s worst inflation. 

As the bolivar collapsed and inflation accelerated, the Banco Central de Venezuela (BCV) became an unreliable source of inflation data. Indeed, from December 2014 until January 2016, the BCV did not report inflation statistics. Then, the BCV pulled a rabbit out of its hat in January 2016 and reported a phony annual inflation rate for the third quarter of 2015. So, the last official inflation data reported by the BCV is almost two years old. To remedy this problem, the Johns Hopkins – Cato Institute Troubled Currencies Project, which I direct, began to measure Venezuela’s inflation in 2013. We measure the monthly and annual inflation rates on a daily basis. We measure. We do not forecast. 

The most important price in an economy is the exchange rate between the local currency and the world’s reserve currency — the U.S. dollar. As long as there is an active black market (read: free market) for currency and the black market data are available, changes in the black market exchange rate can be reliably transformed into accurate estimates of countrywide inflation rates. The economic principle of Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) allows for this transformation.

We compute the implied annual inflation rate on a daily basis by using PPP to translate changes in the VEF/USD exchange rate into an annual inflation rate. The chart below shows the course of that annual rate. Today, a new high of 4651%/yr has been reached (see the chart below).

via http://ift.tt/2oY83Dp Steve H. Hanke