PANIC!

Ouchy! Jay and most of his crew were happy with a bigger cut. September 19, 2024 [WEBSITE]( | [UNSUBSCRIBE]( PANIC! SEAN RING Dear Reader, I almost titled this piece “Mea Culpa II” because it’s the second time I’ve had to eat crow this year. [The first time was in June]( when I thought Jay Powell would act early and decisively by cutting 25 bps during the June FOMC powwow. I was crushed when he didn’t, as I thought, and still think, it would have been the right move. But this time, old Jay Pow caught me out by cutting the Federal Funds rate by 50 basis points, or 0.5%. When I found out, you could’ve knocked me over with a feather. I had a face like a beaten favorite. Only two hours earlier, I told my star student in Frankfurt that Powell wouldn’t cut 50 bps the first time into a cutting cycle. I told him the CME FedWatch Tool had no predictive value and changed its tune every few minutes. Boy, was I wrong this time! I was having dinner with my friends S and J when the news came over the wire. FOMC cuts 50 basis points! “Fifty? WTF? I don’t believe it…” was my reaction. My bewilderment was palpable. Jay Powell didn’t start the hiking cycle in 2021 like he should have; he started it a year late in 2022. Then, he hiked too big all throughout 2022. Now, he’s cutting bigly the first time around in 2024? He should’ve started cutting much sooner, so I guess he’s making up for lost time. I think Jay Powell is panicking. He watched the economy deteriorate to the point he thought he needed to get out the hacksaw. Rickards’ Call I often agree with our macro expert, Jim Rickards, and this time, I thought his logic was flawless. From yesterday’s [Paradigm Pressroom’s Five Bullets]( (bolds mine): “We’re sticking with our 0.25% forecast for three reasons,” says Paradigm’s macro expert Jim Rickards. “The first is that this is the no-drama Fed. They’re definitely cutting rates, but they don’t want to appear panicky or to suggest the economy is worse off than they admit. Far from providing ‘stimulus,’ a 0.50% rate cut may signal recession fears and lead to a stock sell-off. “The second reason is the election itself,” Jim adds. “Delivering a rate cut just six weeks before the presidential election would appear to favor Harris and work to Trump’s disadvantage. “Still, the economy is showing signs of slowing,” he says. “A 0.25% cut will give Harris and the economy a boost (so they believe) without being too blatant. “The third reason is that more rate cuts are on the way. Third-quarter GDP growth looks healthy, at least according to the Atlanta Fed GDPNow tracker, which estimates 3% growth. “The Fed has two more scheduled meetings this year in November and December and will likely cut rates at both meetings,” says Jim. “A 0.50% rate cut can always be rolled out at some future meeting if needed. “In effect, the Fed is saying, ‘What’s the hurry?’ “A 0.25% rate cut will have the desired effect, at least in the Fed’s eyes, without appearing too political or too panicked,” Jim concludes. Honestly, I couldn’t have agreed more. But, of course, it didn’t turn out that way. So, what are the three things I’m concentrating on? [CRITICAL Election Forecast Change From Jim Rickards]( I believe Donald J. Trump just won the 2024 election. But NOT for the reasons you may think… If I’m right… The days leading to the election will cause complete and utter chaos in the markets. [Click here to see my updated 2024 forecast in my emergency election briefing.]( [Click Here To Learn More]( Inflation and Growth The Fed's decision shows that it believes inflationary pressures are subsiding enough to justify more accommodative monetary policy. I think this is delusional. We’re nowhere near the 2% target, not that we should have one at all. A 25 basis point cut is designed to support economic expansion, especially as unemployment has ticked up slightly and wage growth moderates. But a 50 bp cut? That’s plain panic. I now doubt the economy will achieve a "soft landing" (a gentle slowdown without a recession). By this move, Powell himself has signaled a more severe downturn is the likelier case. Labor Market The labor market, although still strong, has shown signs of softening. The Fed’s focus on reducing rates could help prevent further deterioration, ensuring the job market remains stable. But this cut looks like it was made in response to growing economic vulnerabilities. Market Reactions While markets initially reacted positively to the cut, concerns about economic weakness caused stocks to close slightly down for the day. Investors are now grappling with mixed signals—on the one hand, the rate cut provides relief from higher borrowing costs, but on the other, it might reflect underlying economic concerns. Initially, this larger-than-expected cut looked like it would pave the way for further rate reductions later this year. But I’m not sure the Fed is as enthusiastic about that as the market is. So What’s Next? Here’s quite an ominous tweet from Geiger Capital. Credit: @Geiger_Capital Shall we see a spike in unemployment presently? Wrap Up This move is starting to look like a stealth sell signal. The charts are still fine, but I think this could be the beginning of a correction, at least, or a prolonged sell-off into bear market territory. Something is wrong with America’s financial plumbing, and I have a funny feeling Powell knows it and that’s why he convinced most, but not all, of the Fed governors to back his move. Only Michelle Bowman dissented, and that’s a first for a Fed governor since 2005. I’ll be writing more about this in the Morning Reckoning, which will be in your inbox in a few hours. Buckle your seatbelts. All the best, Sean Ring Editor, Rude Awakening X (formerly Twitter): [@seaniechaos]( Rate this email Like Dislike Thanks for rating this content! Looks like something went wrong. Please try to rate again. In Case You Missed It… King: Kamala is Unfit For C-in-C BYRON KING We eagerly await the Fed's lower interest rates so the stock market will continue to rise. Many people appear to think that the U.S. economy absolutely requires lower rates from America’s central bank. Stated another way, fentanyl may be killing off America’s working class, but easy money is the narcotic of choice for financial asset holders. On my end, the hyperfocus on interest rates – dwells on mere fractions of a point, no less! – reflects a self-destructive delusion. Much of the investor and asset-holding class wants markets just to rise, rise, and keep on rising, which enables them to overlook the evident, ongoing, long-term decline in the value of the dollar. Sure, markets may lift up to the stratosphere, if not the ionosphere. Low earth orbit, even! But all along, it’s based on out-of-control government spending and vast deficits. And in tandem, the U.S. currency fades into a shadow and transforms into dust. For example, a one-ounce, $20-face gold coin from 1924 is today, a century later, worth well over $2,500 just for the gold, not allowing for the numismatic angle. U.S. currency: 1924 St. Gaudens double-eagle gold $20 coin. Courtesy Coinweek.com. Do the math; that loss of purchasing power reflects a decline factor of 1-to-125 over ten decades. And at some other time, we’ll drill deeper into this monetary point; but not now. Because while we cool our heels for the looming Fed event regarding interest rates, let’s return for a moment to that so-called debate in Philadelphia last week, between former President Donald Trump and current Vice President Kamala Harris. What a Sorry Spectacle I watched the sorry spectacle so that you didn’t have to. I must add that awareness of these kinds of things is part of my job description at Paradigm Press. In essence, I was paid for my time to watch the candidates, which is to say that if you watched the show, what’s your excuse? Regarding one big debate issue, I can honestly attest that I have no first-hand knowledge about Haitians eating dogs and cats in Springfield, Ohio, or anywhere else. Although, to be fair, nothing shocks me. Import the Third World, and you get the Third World. Indeed, during my lifetime of travels, I’ve seen plenty of odd stuff. It has ranged from monkeys on a stick in the Philippines to barbecued rats in Colombia. But what’s currently cooking in Springfield? I don’t know. My most recent trip to the Buckeye State was to look around East Palestine, the site of a massive train derailment last year. And it’s still an environmental mess, what with all the toxic poisons that spilled and burned. I saw not a single boiled dog, but I definitely smelled nasty chemicals near the main railway tracks. Just another day in Biden-Harris America, eh? Okay, getting back to that presidential debate, the ABC News inquisitors obviously fact-checked the living bejeezus out of Trump, nailing him about thirty times, per some scorekeepers. Kamala waltzed through, of course, with no challenges from the peanut gallery. Coincidence? I think not. Scandalously, Kamala evaded serious answers to almost every question, beginning with the kickoff query: Is the country better off now than four years ago? “Let me tell you about my mother,” said Kamala. Then, she discussed how people in her neighborhood used to cut the grass on their well-manicured lawns. As we used to say in the Navy, “Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot.” Yes, Kamala began her life as just a poor little girl, a child of immigrants. She inferred that she grew up on the other side of the tracks out in Oakland, California (not to mention her years in a very elegant, upscale part of Montreal, Quebec; I’ve been there). Now, she’s on the biggest stage of all stages, basking in the limelight of U.S. history, running for president. Ugh, gag me with a trite narrative. And so it went, ABC question after ABC question. Kamala discussed her proposed “opportunity economy,” whatever that might be. It’s something about handing out $50,000 grants to millions of people so they can all start small businesses. Will this be in lieu of student loans to go to college and study gender inequity? Kamala was quite light on details. Of course, Kamala evaded questions about the 2021 Afghanistan debacle and not quite four years of wide-open American borders under the reign of Biden-Harris. As we’ve all seen on YouTube, when people aren’t dropping from the landing gear of C-17s, they’re walking through holes in what’s left of Trump’s fence lines. Then, they receive a government-paid airline ticket to New York, Boston, Seattle, etc., or perhaps it’s only a bus ticket to some hard-up, former factory town in the heartland, like Springfield, Ohio. Across the 90-minute arc of airtime, Kamala failed to illuminate many other points of her long, abysmal record in public office. Debate-wise much was missing from the story of this mystery candidate who was, until recently, the most unpopular vice president in modern political history. And still, she lurks in the shadows since her ex-cathedra coronation as the Democrat nominee, having sat all of two interviews in two months. Ah, the perks of entitlement and kid-glove handling… Then, post-debate, we learned more about the wiring job. That is, pre-debate, ABC agreed not to ask Kamala about her three-year role in covering up President Joe Biden’s evident senility and infirmness. Plus, no questions from moderators about Kamala’s time as district attorney of San Francisco or as attorney General of the Golden State; in other words, [no Tulsi Gabbard moments for Kamala](. When not evading substantive questions, Kamala reverted to well-scripted, rehearsed zingers with which to bait Trump. Like how his rallies have small attendance (as in “small,” get it?). And there was that by-now classic “very fine people” canard about Trump and Charlottesville. It’s a scurrilous lie long ago debunked, as far back as the day that Orange Man allegedly said the words which were, by any objective analysis, taken entirely out of context. Okay, so politicians gotta be politicians. They huff and puff, and say lotsa stuff, and make all manner of claims about what they’re going to do or not do. And voters out in voter-land nod their heads and feel good about whomever they want to feel good about. It’s politics. But let’s move to the real point here, at least the “real point” to me. [Claim Your Starlink Pre-IPO Prospectus]( This is a critical and time-sensitive message. It’s regarding Starlink, which is expected to be the largest IPO in history – set to take place in as little as a few weeks. And for the first time ever, we’ve found a way for you to profit BEFORE the IPO happens. One of the world’s top venture capitalists and Silicon Valley insiders has just released all of the details… including a prospectus… in this short message. [Click here now to discover how to take action BEFORE the IPO.]( The Biggest of Big Lies As the evening unfolded and candidates unloaded, I just listened and rolled my eyes. At many points, the debate reminded me of driving past those huge cattle and hog feedlots along I-70 in Iowa and Nebraska. Many of the outrageous accusations and political promises were so foul-smelling and over the top that I wished I had a charcoal filter gas mask, if not an oxygen bottle, nearby. But then came what was, in my view, the biggest of the Big Lies, a la Kamala. Scripted and heavily rehearsed, she spoke the words plainly, with that trademark, snotty, kindergarten teacher smirk on her face. [There’s no misinterpretation of what she said]( “As of today, there’s not one member of the United States military who is on active duty, in a combat zone or war zone around the world, for the first time this century.” No, no, no, you lying sack of sh!t. That’s entirely wrong, and you ought to know it. All this while my U.S. military veteran, 30-years-in-the-Navy, saltwater-laced-blood just plain boiled. Such a miserable witch! It’s the bald-faced lie of an uncaring, psychopath monster. Cynic that I am, after many years of living within this wreck of a declining culture, I know that American politicians lie like rugs. And not to be dismissive about it, but they can lie all they want about campaign promises for mythical opportunity zones, or how many or few immigrants walk across the border, or what tax rates will be, or fracking for oil and gas, or protests about General Lee’s statue in Virginia. Liars gotta lie. But to say that no U.S. troops are in harm’s way in war zones? No, no, no, no, no… You hit a nerve with that one, fool. Indeed, Kamala is either immensely ignorant to the point of frighteningly stupid (a diagnosis that’s definitely on the table), or she’s monumentally ill-informed, which means that her staff are disgusting political hacks who totally suck (ditto). And to be accurate, it could be a lot of both. First, my son serves in the U.S. Army, and his unit is in the final stages of gearing up to head to the Middle East, directly into an active combat zone where, in one place or another, U.S. troops take fire almost every day. His unit will replace a similar Army unit – filled with other people’s sons and daughters – that’s already over there, taking fire and, in terms of operational rotations, scheduled to return to the U.S. in due course. And now, on this particular point, I’ll refrain from saying more out of family privacy and Army security. Meanwhile, it’s more than public knowledge that U.S. troops are [all over the place in this world]( in harm’s way. How can Kamala not be aware of this? Consider the USS Eisenhower (CVN-69) battle group, which just returned from a very long deployment to the Red Sea and the northern Indian Ocean, where every ship in the fleet – U.S. and allied, from destroyers to cargo vessels – spent months on alert, dodging Houthi/Iranian drones and missiles. Plus, not to neglect U.S. Air Force combat and support aircraft that joined the fray. Night launch from USS Eisenhower (CVN-69), contra Houthis in Yemen. U.S. Navy photo. A well-regarded YouTuber named Ward Carroll (Cdr, USN/ret) interviewed both the [battle group admiral]( and [aircraft carrier captain]( about what life was like under constant attack, 24/7 for months at a time. Per the admiral, in another interview, the Eisenhower experience was the “most intense sustained combat at sea for the Navy since World War II.” Got that, Kamala? War zone? Incoming rounds? Not since World War II? Does this register? Beyond just this, I could go all over the map of the world and point to where other American troops are in harm’s way, in places where steel rain either falls or might very well fall soon. How about Eastern Europe and Ukraine? We have U.S. people in all manner of aircraft, ships, and ground positions all over the region, definitely targeted by Russian forces but not (yet) being publicly blown up; but keep escalating those attacks against Russia, and as the saying goes, F-A-F-O. Plus, we have “whomever” on the U.S. payroll – active duty, or some other oddball legal status – running weapon complexes like Patriot and HIMARS missiles in Ukraine; that is, they fire ordnance downrange towards Russia. Those high-tech systems reflect the top level of classified U.S. weapons. And your run-of-the-mill Ukrainian soldat does not sit at the console, program target sets, and process the intelligence back and forth. No, the operators are people of other nationalities, to be sure (and I’m being very circumspect here). And you don’t have to do too much open-source intelligence work to learn that Russians have destroyed and/or captured more than a few HIMARS, for example, and collected passports, ID cards, credit cards, personal effects, and much more from dead bodies. And guess what? C’mon… Guess what the Russians learned? Well, yes, it’s what you might think. You Want WHO to be Commander in Chief? Right there, with that idiotic comment during the debate, and on that single point alone, Kamala told the worst sort of lie, the biggest of Big Lies, a massive, bloody lie about war and peace. Kamala lied about U.S. military personnel at the front lines of hostilities, literally under fire, taking vast risks, and on occasion being wounded and killed. Cavalier to the point of odiousness, she did everything but check her wristwatch, like Joe Biden did during the return of dead American troops in 2021. To me, what Kamala said is the worst sort of lie. It’s disgusting, vile, and beneath the dignity of anyone who aspires to the top job of the Republic. With a straight face, she told Americans that their sons and daughters were alright and not getting shot at. In the context of her comment, she bragged about what great peacemakers she and her colleagues have been. All this when the truth is that, no, our men and women are in grave danger in many places, and it’s all getting worse. In this regard, Kamala represents a form of national-level misgovernance that has brought the U.S. to the very edge of war in many parts of the world, if not a looming nuclear war with Russia. And actually, that’s all I have to say just now. I appreciate that you read this far, and thank you for subscribing. Best wishes and good luck to us all, and may God help us. All the best, Byron W. King Contributing Editor Rude Awakening ☰ ⊗ [UPDATE PREFERENCES]( [Contact Us]( © 2024 Paradigm Press, LLC. 1001 Cathedral Street, Baltimore, MD 21201. By submitting your email address, you consent to Paradigm Press, LLC. delivering daily email issues and advertisements. To end your Rude Awakening e-mail subscription and associated external offers sent from Rude Awakening, feel free to [click here,]( or manage your newsletter preferences [here.]( Please note: the mailbox associated with this email address is not monitored, so do not reply to this message. We welcome comments or suggestions at feedback@rudeawakening.info. This address is for feedback only. For questions about your account or to speak with customer service, [contact us here]( or call (844)-731-0984. Although our employees may answer your general customer service questions, they are not licensed under securities laws to address your particular investment situation. 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