Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Moral Hazard: the Tyranny of the Oligarchs

 

"Moral hazard is the probability that a party insulated from risk will behave differently from the way they would behave if fully exposed to the risk.  Moral hazard arises because an individual or institution does not bear the full consequences of its actions, and therefore has a tendency to act with increasing recklessness, literally 'without reckoning.'  It also encourages the rise to power of sociopaths in society as a whole.

It is difficult to explain moral hazard to tenured professors or the pampered princes of bureaucracy, who beat the drum with their silver spoons in support of shifting the risk of loss to the public every time that Wall Street falls into one of its own schemes and blows itself up.

It is a lesson that the average person learns by the age of twelve and relearns, sometimes spectacularly, at least once in young adulthood.  If you do something wrong there can be bad outcomes, and you will pay the price and penalty.  Unfortunately there is a small but powerful oligarchy of privilege that is trying to project themselves onto the global stage while believing that they are immune to ordinary consequence, and have become addicted to the notion that 'others must pay' for their failures.

Moral hazard comes from rewarding bad behaviour in markets with wristslaps and bailouts. It is a danger to the economy and to the public.

Now we might expect even more brazen attempts to game the system. This inevitably leads to wild gyrations in stocks and bonds and commodities.  History suggests ever more brazen price manipulation so disconnected from reality that actual physical shortages result because of the corruption of the market pricing mechanism.

Can't happen? Enron made it happen in the energy markets, and almost brought California, a state the size of most countries, to its knees.

The wristslaps and bailouts will continue until these modern maestros kill themselves or someone else, and create damage too great to be bought off in the backrooms of the county courthouse.

At least their descent from the heights will be impressive, if you can avoid the impact crater."

Jesse, Moral Hazard, 22 March 2008

 

Stocks had a mixed, wide ranging day.

Gold and silver rebounded sharply and went out near the highs.

It must be the day before a stock option expiration.

VIX continued to fall, expressing the general 'what me worry' stance amongst those who manage other people's money.

The Dollar fell back a bit.

Trump gave a speech to the Arab world repudiating the whole 'make the world safe for democracy by nation-building' stance of US foreign policy.

In other words, he is signalling a reordering of US interests in place since Bill Clinton, although actions will speak much louder than words.

After all, he's a salesman, and he's talking his book to make deals for the moment. 

There is a lot of power and vested interests stacked against any change.

This might be an interesting weekend.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Elite, Self-Perpetuating Oligarchies

“Before mass leaders seize the power to fit reality to their lies, their propaganda is marked by its extreme contempt for facts as such, for in their opinion fact depends entirely on the power of the man who can fabricate it.”

Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1951

"Seneca had made the bargain that many good men have made when agreeing to aid bad regimes.   On the one hand, their presence strengthens the regime and helps it endure.  But their moral influence may also improve the regime's behavior or save the lives of its enemies.  For many, this has been a bargain worth making, even if it has cost them—as it may have cost Seneca—their immortal soul.  The Rome he has been trained to serve, the Rome of Augustus and Germanicus, was gone.  In its place stood Neropolis, ruled by a megalomaniac brat.”

James Romm, Dying Every Day: Seneca at the Court of Nero, 2014

"The end result was to be a new Imperial Order and a New World Empire run by elite, self-perpetuating oligarchies from the leading nations of the earth."

Dr. Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope, 1966, p. 860

"Hell for all eternity, for so little in exchange.  It is true in many respects he assumed the role of the charlatan, yet how apropos, considering his willingness to follow the Father of Lies and deception."

E.A. Bucchianeri, Faust: My Soul Be Damned for the World, 2008

"And Peter understood that neither Nero, nor all his legions, could overcome the living truth — that they could not overwhelm it with tears or blood, and that now its victory was beginning.  He understood with equal force why the Lord had turned him back on the road.  That city of pride, of crime, of wickedness, and of a lust for power, was beginning to be His city."

Henryk Sienkiewicz, Quo Vadis, 1905


And the beat goes on.

Have a pleasant evening.

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - And Then the Harvest of Sorrows

 

"And Abraham said, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not change and repent, even if someone were to rise from the dead.’”

Luke 16:30-31

"It is the time of the harvest, and the reaper cuts into the ripe grain with wide strokes.  Mourning takes up her abode in the country cottages, and there is no one to dry the tears of the mothers. Whoever today still doubts the reality, the existence of demonic powers, has failed by a wide margin to understand the metaphysical background of this war.  Behind the concrete, the visible events, behind all objective, logical considerations, we find the irrational element: the struggle against the demon, against the servants of the Antichrist.

Everywhere and always demonic powers lurk in the dark, waiting for the moment when man is weak. Man is free, to be sure, but without the true God he is defenseless against the principle of evil."

The White Rose, Fourth Leaflet, Munich, 1942

"Because of your hard and unrepentant hearts you store up wrath for the Day when God's righteous judgement will be revealed, who will render to each according to what they have done."

Romans 2:5-6

"You murder the prophets, and abuse those whom God has sent to you as messengers.  How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her young under her wings.   But you would not let me. As you have willed it, so your house is now yours to command— but is made desolate.’”

Matthew 23:37-38

 

It's funny how people can discover how easy it is sometimes to pull strings and make things happen.  It works, and they get away with it.  And even if it is discovered, they don't believe there will be any accountability for various reasons: who they know, what denials they can hide behind, the power of their positions.

The equity and risk markets are being nicely set up for a waterfall decline.  

Don't act too shocked.  We have been here twice before at least in fairly recent memory.

Gold and silver rebounded a bit.  

Silver has actually been doing reasonably well in this 'trade deal' boogie woogie.

Gold is a much more prominent elder brother.   But it will be a bulwark in the days to come.

VIX is not at the level of complacency.  

It is hard to say exactly when, and what will specifically get the ball rolling.

What facade will start to crumble, what thin veneer of responsibility will crack, what shocking event may happen.

But it is more probable now because of what has been done.

It will most likely not be the end of it.  

And the economic consequences are nothing compared to what you really have at risk. 

Cycles of greed and corruption tend to have a great deal of momentum, and tend to falter in stages, until they end in a harvest of sorrows.

Be aware of who it is that you serve, and pray not to falter, and lose the love in your hearts.

There will be a stock market option expiration on Friday. 

Have a pleasant evening.

 

Stocks and Precious Metals Charts - Grinding On Towards a Grim Conclusion

 

"They worshiped the beast and asked, 'Who is like the beast? Who can stand against it?'”

Revelation 13:3

"America is caught in a confidence or credibility trap, in which the changes, investigations, and reforms necessary to restore trust to an economy or market are rendered unlikely because doing so would expose a pervasive corruption that the principals fear would destroy the careers of politicians and business people who may have permitted and even appeared to facilitate the control fraud that caused the financial crisis in the first place.  Personal risk trumps public stewardship.

The fraudulent activity is covered up and therefore continues or at the very least appears to continue, crowding out most productive business investment and activity which cannot possibly hope to compete with the highly profitable fraudulent activity ad asset bubbles under such opaque and uncertain circumstances.  Informed market participants are unwilling to invest their liquid assets in a system which they suspect is riddled with accounting fraud, insider trading, and regulatory weaknesses, except of course in a few situations and somewhat ironically in some existing frauds, such as a bubble in equity valuations for example, which they think they understand.

The American government is indeed acting as if it is involved in a massive coverup of a control fraud and corruption that could perhaps be the worst in its history.  I think many people who are looking at this know in their hearts that all is not well, that there is something not quite right in the current situation.  How else can we explain such massive and widespread financial fraud, with so few meaningful indictments, or even ongoing investigations with credible disclosures?   And the worst perpetrators appear to be dictating the remedies and reforms to the system for this government sponsored recovery."

Jesse, America Trapped in a Massive Coverup of Control Fraud and Corruption, 22 January 2011

"The ultimate purpose of crime is to establish an endless empire.  It seeks a state of complete insecurity and anarchy, founded upon the tainted ideals of a world thought doomed to annihilation.   When humanity, subjugated by the terror of crime, has been driven mad by fear and horror, and when chaos has become the supreme law, then the time for the empire of lawlessness will have come."

Fritz Lang, Das Testament des Dr. Mabuse, 1933


Stocks exploded higher on the news of a 'deal' between China and the US on tariffs over the weekend.

Gold was hammered lower, as the Dollar rose sharply.

Silver actually gained a bit with equities.

VIX is now at a level where we would start looking more seriously for a retracement of all this exuberance.

There will be a stock option expiration of a sort on Friday.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

Have a pleasant evening.