ALWAYS CONSULT YOUR INVESTMENT PROFESSIONAL BEFORE MAKING ANY INVESTMENT DECISION
January 30, 2026 | Mindless Doesn’t End Well
The content of this discussion is clear-eyed and important. Each of us must decide how to allocate our savings given the circumstances we are living through. Mindless following can appear to be progress until suddenly the bill comes due. Has the rally in silver gone so far now that the metal’s price action is actually […]
January 30, 2026 | Physical Bank Branches Disappearing – Relationship Banking is Dead
Physical bank branches are disappearing along with relationship banking. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) files state that the US lost a net total of 339 bank branches in December 2025. The S&P Global and Federal Reserve found that the US has been losing, on average, 1,600 bank branches per year. Santander […]
January 30, 2026 | Palantir Technologies is a Risky and Controversial Company
Palantir Technologies is one of the most valuable companies in the U.S. stock market—and one of the least transparent. Investors are clearly smitten. The shares are up 133% in the past year, pushing Palantir’s market capitalization to roughly US$400 billion. Yet annual revenues are about US$4 billion. That implies a valuation of 100 times sales, a level rarely seen outside […]
January 29, 2026 | Potential Homebuyers Walking Away at Record Pace
We are witnessing an unmistakable shift in the US housing market, not a bubble pop like 2008, but a market regime change characterized by buyers retreating as inventory rises and affordability remains strained. Recent data from Redfin shows that roughly 40,000 US home-purchase agreements were canceled in December, representing about 16.3% of homes that […]
January 29, 2026 | Frozen Housing Markets Hurting Jobs and Economic Activity
Housing mean reversion is hurting jobs and economic activity. A building industry association says 100-thousand jobs in construction and related sectors are at risk. As Alan Carter reports, the housing downturn could erase $20 billion for Ontario’s economy. Here is a direct video link. Home markets are floundering in many US cities, too. The US National […]
January 29, 2026 | Will Gold and Silver Tank Along With Equities?
The broad equity indexes — especially the tech-heavy NASDAQ — are falling hard this morning. This was always going to happen at some point, with the real question being how it would affect gold and silver. In other words, will our babies be thrown out with the bathwater when margin calls start forcing leveraged speculators […]
January 28, 2026 | Microsoft Provided the FBI with Encryption Keys
Microsoft provided the FBI with Bitlocker encryption keys. It should come as no surprise that a US-based cloud storage service provided US intelligence with backdoor access. Encryption is only as strong as the one who controls the key to lock it. Microsoft, the world’s dominant provider of desktop and enterprise systems, complied with an FBI warrant and […]
January 28, 2026 | The India-EU Trade Deal
Deemed the “mother of all deals” by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, India and the European Union signed a historic trade agreement that will permit near free trade between the two economies. The EU plans to phase out tariffs on Indian goods by up to 95% over a multi-year period. India will begin phasing […]
January 28, 2026 | The Wealth Concentration Engine: Rethinking America’s Financial Plumbing
From Scheer Post A Jan. 17 article on Quartz Markets by Catherine Baab reports that JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Bank of America returned nearly all of their 2025 profits to shareholders. Goldman Sachs returned $16.78 billion on $17.18 billion in earnings, meaning 97.7% of its earnings went to shareholders. Wells Fargo, […]
January 28, 2026 | Follow the Money
In March 2024, the Real Estate/Gold ratio signaled that money was moving from real estate into gold. From Jan 2021 to March 2024, my Roth IRA was invested in two REITs – AVB and EQR. During those 38 months, the total return (including dividends) for AVB was 36.1% – and it was 27.6% […]
January 28, 2026 | Humanity, AI and Financial Markets
Cue the nervous laughter when watching the segment below. Financial markets have already become so complex and algorithm-driven that even trained experts are struggling to comprehend the moving parts. The timeless adage that we should only invest in what we understand is being largely ignored. Meanwhile, those who don’t even know the questions to ask […]
January 27, 2026 | Why Private Credit Wants You to Buy In
Our month-end letter for January discusses the links between private equity, private credit and elevated financial risks for the rest of us. The segment below offers a primer. Opacity and complexity in financial products often cloak elevated risk and even deceit. Private credit, a form of lending by non-bank financial institutions to businesses outside of […]
January 27, 2026 | Zelensky – NATO’s puppet
QUESTION: The Kremlin refuses to end the war in Ukraine unless the Donbas region is surrendered. Zelensky has previously stated he will not hand over the Donbas region to Moscow. This looks like what you have said. No resolution. Are we headed into more warfare in February/March? DG ANSWER: Zelensky is a piece of shit […]
January 26, 2026 | China is Coming for Our Gold Miners
With the world hurtling towards a monetary reset, everyone suddenly wants the gold miners. Just this morning: China’s Zijin Gold to buy Canadian miner Allied Gold for about $4 billion (Reuters) – Chinese miner Zijin Gold will buy Canadian miner Allied gold for C$5.5 billion ($4.02 billion) in cash, the companies said on Monday, as […]
January 26, 2026 | The Compounding Costs of Sanctioned Gambling
Empirical research suggests that expanded gambling access—particularly low-friction, online sports betting—has been associated with measurable increases in consumer financial distress, including higher bankruptcy filings in U.S. states following legalization. The evidence is strongest where gambling becomes more accessible and continuous, rather than episodic (e.g., mobile wagering versus destination casinos). At the individual level, a robust […]
January 26, 2026 | Extinction Level Event
Happy Monday Morning! Last week we wrote a piece titled ‘Plan B’ in which we highlighted the flood of rental supply driving rents lower. Much of this has been derived from developers shifting new projects from pre-sales to rentals amidst the sudden disappearance of investors. We already knew the pre-sale market was bad, but even […]
January 25, 2026 | Silver & Confiscations
QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I am new to Socrates. Everyone told me you have done more research and have real-world experience unmatched in the finance world. Your post on silver and the long-term blew my mind. Nobody has ever explained the real history of silver and confiscations. Is this why you have been saying ‘by silver […]
January 25, 2026 | Big Time Change
Today we continue anticipating 2026, this time shifting for the first part of the letter from economic issues to geopolitics before making some of my personal general forecasts. Economics and geopolitics are closely related. Geopolitics is about the way national leaders interact with their counterparts, but economic trends also define and constrain their goals. […]
January 25, 2026 | What Rough Beast?
If you can’t guess what commodity the chart shows, you must be living on Mars. It is in fact a long-term picture of silver, which went ballistic in December. The price has doubled since, blowing out a $50 top that had stood since 1980. That price became a part of silver’s legend, since it is […]
January 24, 2026 | Trading Desk Notes for January 24, 2026
Trump fatigue? The S&P gapped lower and closed on its lows on Tuesday after the MLK long weekend (blue ellipse), following Trump’s bellicosity over Greenland and ahead of his scheduled Davos speech on Wednesday. (US bonds and the USD also fell sharply on Tuesday in a “sell the USA” wave.) The S&P rallied on Wednesday, when […]
January 24, 2026 | United States Withdrawal from the World Health Organization
The United States Withdrawal from the World Health Organization: A Cyclical Analysis of Sovereignty and Global Health Governance January 23, 2026 The Trump administration’s decision to withdraw the United States from the World Health Organization represents far more than a simple policy shift. This marks a critical inflection point in the post-World War II international […]
January 24, 2026 | The British Civil War Enters Its Satirical Phase
About a year ago, a political scientist predicted civil war in the UK. Here’s the intro of a post I published at the time: I just watched a disturbingly plausible video about the rising odds of a UK civil war. The source is David Betz, a professor of “war in the modern world” at King’s College, London. He […]
January 24, 2026 | Tech Talk for Saturday January 24th 2026
The Bottom Line Economic focus this week is on the FOMC decision on interest rates released on Wednesday at 2:00 PM EST. Quarterly earnings focuses this week are on Microsoft and Meta Platform on Wednesday, Apple and Amazon on Thursday and ExxonMobil and Chevron on Friday. Earnings and Revenues Consensus for S&P 500 companiesSource: www.factset.com […]
January 23, 2026 | Carney Takes a Risky Gamble with a Bet on China
High Risk, High Reward: Carney’s China Gamble Prime Minister Mark Carney has defied Washington by striking a sweeping trade deal with China—slashing tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and dismantling long-standing barriers on agricultural exports. Under the agreement, China will cut import levies on Canadian canola, canola meal, lobster, crab, and peas. In return, Canada will sharply reduce […]
January 23, 2026 | Gold, Silver, and Their Big Round Numbers
The odds that $5,000 gold and $100 silver would happen on the same day seemed pretty slim. Yet here we are, with that being a very real possibility: There’s no deep message here. It’s just pretty cool to be right side of history in such a decisive way. Even wilder times are no doubt coming. […]