ALWAYS CONSULT YOUR INVESTMENT PROFESSIONAL BEFORE MAKING ANY INVESTMENT DECISION
May 25, 2025 | Inflation Standoff
The Strategic Investment Conference is over. I’m now in my annual recovery period, during which I try to absorb the informational firehose I (with thousands of others) just experienced. I often find SIC’s key insights come from unexpected directions. I spend months organizing the agenda in what I think is a comprehensible way. But once […]
May 18, 2025 | How We Got Here
We are in the middle of the Strategic Investment Conference, a fabulous gathering of some of the best economic, political, and geopolitical minds anywhere. I’m really proud of what we’re doing. And at the last minute, we’ve added Dr. Mehmet Oz, nationally regarded cardiovascular surgeon, author of numerous best-selling books with my friend Dr. Mike […]
May 11, 2025 | Tension in the Sandpile
I’ve been writing about tariffs for a couple of months now, focusing mostly on the macroeconomic harm and the costs they impose on small businesses. Today I want to consider something else: the new risks they are adding to the financial system alongside the old risks. We had a small taste of it when markets […]
May 4, 2025 | Soft Data Gets Softer
Economic data can be soft or hard. “Soft” data reflects attitudes, expectations, opinions, and feelings. It’s a step removed from the “hard” data reflecting actual events. Soft data is still valuable because future expectations shape the hard data that follows. Looking at the most recent soft data, I found myself consulting the thesaurus for a […]
April 27, 2025 | Tariff-Induced Paralysis
In some kinds of surgery, it is necessary to keep the patient extremely still because even small, involuntary movements can cause damage. Anesthesiologists administer “paralytic” drugs so the surgeons can do their work safely. Thus, a condition we would normally dread actually helps restore us to health. Tariffs can have a similar effect on the […]
April 20, 2025 | The Uncertainty World
Markets don’t like uncertainty. It is a cliché, but for a very good reason. It is more than a truism. In fact, businesses don’t like uncertainty. You and I don’t like uncertainty in our personal lives. When we go to the store, we want to be certain that what we are looking for is there, […]
April 13, 2025 | The Uncertainty Recession
You probably noticed we are having one of those “weeks when decades happen.” Notice also, however, that we are still here. Your investments and businesses may be bruised but you’re still in the game. Fast-moving events are hard to cover in my letters. Anything I say could be rendered laughably wrong by the time you […]
April 6, 2025 | The Tariff Recession?
Good news: Tariffs will not make the world end. American businesses will do what they do best, which is adapt. While the probability of a recession has increased, we always get through it and the best businesses thrive. Unless directly affected by tariffs, don’t change your personal plans that much. Much of this may change […]
March 30, 2025 | Do Trade Deficits Matter?
Financial market news has seemingly become all tariffs, all the time. The president’s plan, whatever it is, seems to spring from his belief that trade deficits are bad and must be eliminated. Tariffs are just a means to that end. I have a somewhat different view. I think the US trade deficit, in itself, is […]
March 23, 2025 | The Inflationista Illuminati, Part 2
The theme among so many writers seems to be “vibe shift.” And indeed, there is a concern the economy is slowing and may even be in a recession. That is certainly what today’s writer and my friend, Danielle DiMartino Booth, points to in this second part of her data-driven inflation analysis, which I share below. […]
March 16, 2025 | The Inflationista Illuminati
Last week we published a chart of the Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model, which had just dropped sharply to a -2.4% real GDP growth forecast for the first quarter of 2025. This model can be volatile. Its latest big swing was mostly an artifact of spiking gold imports. Economic growth prospects do seem to have dimmed […]
March 10, 2025 | When Valuations Collide…
“Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.” —Yale economist Irving Fisher 12 days before Black Monday in October 1929 “Wall Street indexes predicted nine out of the last five recessions!” —MIT professor Paul Samuelson in 1966 Last week, we explored the Crestmont Stock Market Matrix and its insight into the drivers of stock […]
March 2, 2025 | The Bull’s Eye Matrix: Updated
Bull’s Eye Investing was published on January 1, 2004. It quickly became a bestseller. The main thing that people still ask me about was a trifold spread color chart of stock market returns since 1900. Returns were color-coded so readers could see the ebb and flow of returns over time. That remarkable representation of market performance […]
February 24, 2025 | Revenue Thoughts
Last week we began discussing the import tariffs President Trump has been threatening. Most (China is the exception) have not taken effect yet. It’s possible they will never happen or will be quickly modified or rescinded as happened in Trump’s first term. Real or not, the fact these tariffs might happen affects business and consumer confidence, which […]
February 16, 2025 | Trump Confusion Syndrome
I think I’m going to start a new 12-step program. I sense there are a lot of potential members. The meetings would start with something like this: “Hi. My name is John. I have Trump Confusion Syndrome. I don’t think it’s contagious, but many of my friends are suffering similar symptoms. “I like a lot […]
February 9, 2025 | China’s Underground Banking Empire: How Drugs & Money Corrupt America | Sam Cooper
February 2, 2025 | Why DeepSeek Is Bullish for the World
“There are decades when nothing happens, and weeks when decades happen,” says a quote from Vladimir Lenin, who may have copied it from someone else. Regardless of origin, it is true and will be even more true as technology and even government changes faster. We may have just lived through such a week for the […]
January 19, 2025 | A Possible Storm
Rain can be either refreshing or destructive. It can make plants grow or produce devastating floods. But in all cases, it’s largely outside human control. Or is it? True, we have little control over whether rain will fall. We have a lot of control over how it affects us, though. Sturdy homes and good infrastructure can keep […]
January 12, 2025 | A Partly Cloudy Year
Weather forecasters tell us what kind of weather we should expect. They can be wrong, but their short-term outlooks are generally reliable. The old joke that economists exist to make weathermen look good is funny because it has a ring of ironic truth. Other things aside, though, we usually prefer moderate weather. Most of us would be […]
January 5, 2025 | A Controversial Start
It was an amazingly short week, punctuated by making 20 gallons of chili, serving almost 300 of my neighbors, and then recovering the next day, which didn’t leave a lot of time for in-depth analysis and forecasts. I’m sure you will be happy with the shortened letter as we cover some of the main events […]
December 29, 2024 | Live Free and Don’t Die
As I said last week, I am working on a book outlining five different theories on historical cycles and how they all seem to “climax” around 2030. I’m also very concerned that around that time (if not before), we will see the bond market begin reacting to the increasingly large national debt. I came across […]
December 22, 2024 | Quantum Supremacy
As longtime readers know, I am working on a book outlining five different theories on historical cycles and how their predicted “climaxes” all occur around 2030. I’m also very concerned that around that time (if not before) we will see the bond market react badly to the fast-growing national debt. While my poor editors at […]
December 15, 2024 | Demanding Energy
Energy is everything. Or, if Einstein was right, you and I are just energy in material form. Accelerate us to lightspeed squared and we might become something else. All economic activity involves converting energy from one form to another. This requires harnessing sufficient quantities of usable energy. That task is becoming more difficult, to the point economic […]
December 8, 2024 | Homes for Christmas
Ever notice how “home” is so important to our holiday traditions? It’s hard to imagine Christmas without images of a fireplace, a tree, some food, and rooms with festive decorations. Families gather in such rooms to form lifelong bonds and memories. My neighborhood here in Puerto Rico really goes all out on Christmas decorations. There […]
November 24, 2024 | Waste, Fraud, and Abuse
Politicians and think-tank wonks of all stripes love to condemn government “waste, fraud, and abuse.” But saying it isn’t hard. Who is the opposition? No one says we need more waste, fraud, and abuse. We’re all 100% agreed all three are bad. It’s when you get specific—saying this agency or that program isn’t accomplishing what it should—that […]