Postal Banking: An Idea Whose Time Has Come Again

My Comments: Last month, while standing in line to buy stamps, I overhead the person behind me complaining about the apparent inability of the Post Office to adapt and have enough people behind the counter. His vitriol made me think he was probably a Trump supporter. I kept my mouth shut but reminded myself the …

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The Fed: Mission Accomplished?

My Comments: I think the Fed's raising interest rates the other day is more symbolic than meaningful. The follow on events were/are inevitable. As usual, life does not move in a straight line. And like death and taxes, interest rates had to eventually move off Zero where they’ve been for many, many months. So moving …

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The Fed’s Rate Hike – What it Means

My Comments: In the past months and years I’ve featured the comments of Scott Minerd, the Chairman of Investment and CIO of Guggenheim Partners. This organization is not big, relatively speaking, as they ONLY have about $250 billion under management. (I could live very well on a tiny fraction of what that amount earns every …

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Russia Running Out Of Money

My Comments: Global media is full of woe and gloom about the near term economic future of the US and the rest of the planet. This has the potential to add to that gloomy forecast. I have strong memories of the Cold War and the threat posed by the Soviet Union. While the Soviet Union …

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Investing In Our Families

My Comments: When I saw this, I was surprised. When you have family wealth of many billions, you don’t expect to see a nuanced economic commentary. It’s refreshing to see someone clearly at the very top of the economic pile, writing in recognition of those near the bottom. Of course, it helps that if those …

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A Wicked Wind Will Blow In 2016

My Comments: Are you wondering about your investments going forward? This will give you pause. Dec. 4, 2015 by Bret Jensen The market had a huge rally to end the week and clawed back Thursday's large losses. The trigger for the rise was a better than expected November Jobs Report that also had an upward …

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Always Think About Inflation

My Thoughts About This: Inflation is one of those existential threats I always talk about with clients. But it’s like watching a car rust. You simply don’t notice it on a daily or monthly basis. But the Oh MY God inflation that happened to the Weimer Republic in 1921-24 or perhaps more recently in Argentina, …

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China’s Currency Conundrum

My Comments: Our standard of living, yours and mine, used to be a function of how well we built our house and how well we managed to feed and clothe ourselves. That was perhaps 250 years ago, a single blip in the passage of time. A blip later it’s a little more complicated. Among the …

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9 Charts Showing Big Global Slowdown Is On Its Way

My Comments: There are two messages here. The first is a global recession is most likely about to happen. The second is the published report has 49 pages with dozens of charts. If looking at charts makes you happy, you will be thrilled. Will Martin Nov. 14, 2015 The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development …

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Fifth Generation Warfare: Follow the Food!

My Thoughts About This: For several years I followed the writings of Thomas P. M. Barnett. About 3 years ago, he suddenly closed his blog. He posted thousands of ideas and articles about global economics and security issues, most of which made sense. I never forgot one of them where he predicted that by 2045, …

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