Rick Mills: Should we leave the creation of new money in the hands of bankers or place its creation solely with our government? Read more…

David Zeiler: With bloated federal budgets pushing the United States deeper and deeper into debt, you’d think Congress finally would be putting a stop to wasteful government spending. Read more…

Will cities all over America erupt in violence if Mitt Romney wins the election?  Right now we are probably witnessing the most divisive campaign in modern U.S. history, and both sides Read more…

The global debt crisis has reached a dangerous new phase.  Unfortunately, most Americans are not taking notice of it yet because most of the action is taking place overseas, and because U.S. financial markets are riding high.  But just because the global economic crisis is unfolding Read more…

Mac Slavo: That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall Read more…

David Zeiler: The United States is on the verge of a crisis over a key strategic resource it once almost completely controlled. Read more…

The middle class in America is being systematically destroyed.  Once upon a time the United States had the largest and most vibrant middle class in the history of the world.  The rest of the globe looked at us in envy and wondered what we were doing right.  But now everything Read more…

Kevin McElroy: I firmly believe that the U.S. dollar is a burning match. The longer I hold one in my hands, the less it’s worth. Eventually, it appears, it will be worth nothing at all, and I’ll get burned. Read more…

Michael Snyder: A very large segment of the population has figured out that it can use voting as a tool to get more money and benefits from the government, Read more…

Dominique de Kevelioc de Bailleul: “Both parties are driven by the neoconservatives (“neocons”) who believe that American hegemony over the world is worth nuclear war to accomplish,” states former Asst. Secretary of Treasury and Reagonics architect Paul Craig Roberts Read more…

Michael Snyder: What a depressing choice the American people are being presented with this year.  We are at a point in our history where we desperately need a change of direction Read more…

Michael Snyder: There are more Americans dependent on the federal government than ever before in U.S. history.  According to the Survey of Income and Program Participation conducted by the U.S. Census, well over 100 million Americans are enrolled in at least one welfare Read more…

by  Chris Georgopoulos, SmartStops contributor

Reading financial articles can be, let’s say boring at times. This article we are going to try to spice it up, let’s play a game of role playing.  Famed speculator, Jesse Livermore once was quoted…

“If I were walking down a railroad track and saw an express train coming at me at 60 miles an hours.  I would be a damned fool not to get off the track and let the train go by. After it had passed, I could always get back on the track, if I desired.” –Reminiscences of a Stock Operator, Edwin Lefevre.  

For this game let’s rename the train, Best Buy stock (BBY: NYSE), the ““I” in walking down the track” we can call the shareholders of Best Buy and the speed of the train, the issues.  The game is scored by the costs of each decision. Whoever has the best return wins!

It is the end of summer 2005, Best Buy is approaching $80/share and the future couldn’t be brighter. The tech bubble burst is ancient history, the housing market is hot, interest rates are low and every house in America is an ATM for consumer spending.  You are on the railroad track…there isn’t a train in sight! 

It is now the beginning of fall 2008; Best Buy has fallen to the mid $40s in defiance of the market making new highs and there are rumors of problems in Mortgage backed securities.  (Note:  Sidestepping risk is now made possible with the release of SmartStops.net  which if had been available would have had you out in the $70 range in 2005).  Your friend has made a fortune flipping speculative properties in south Florida and Las Vegas, but you see he is worried. He still has five houses on the market with almost no personal income… (You know how this story ends)  You can hear a train coming and it sounds like it’s really moving!

Only a few months later, Best Buy is trading under $18/share!   The rumors are true; the housing market has crushed the stock market. It seems nobody thought housing prices would ever go down and the economy is on the verge of total failure. You can now see the train, its moving fast and finally you start to consider if you should actually get off the tracks.

(SmartStops.net   issued two Long-Term exit signals in 2008 the first January 4, 2008 at $46.80 and on September 16, 2008 at $40.68. That’s a  $22 per share savings by sidestepping risk.)

It is two years later; Best Buy is trading back in the mid $40s. The US Government stepped in and back-stopped the entire financial system, confidence has been temporarily restored. The train has slowed to almost a complete stop; you are relieved and continue your stroll.  

(SmartStops.net   issued two Short-Term reentry triggers starting on December 17, 2008 at $28.88 and on March 17, 2009 at $30.89. Stock protection of $15/share.)

Its September 13^th 2011, Best Buy has once again been cut in half and is trading around $23/share. They have just announced another disappointing earnings release.  Best Buy unlike its failed competitor Circuit city, is still profitable and is forecasted to grow, (Yahoo finance has 5 year growth estimates just over 9%) but their business model has been questioned. Online rivals such as Amazon.com (AMZN: NASDAQ), Overstock.com (OSTK: NASDAQ) andEBAY.com (EBAY: NASDAQ) have taken away market share and lowered margins. These questions are shown in the technical breakdown of the stock which has been in a downtrend since April of 2010 and is now approaching new 52 week lows.  The train has started moving again, at top speed! It’s so close you know what color the eyes of the engineer are!

SmartStops.net   has issued multiple risk triggers in the past year, with the first one on December 14 2010 at $40.19 thus offering protection of $16 per share if the first one was acted upon.

Lots of pessimism since QE2 is deemed a failure and no QE3 is coming.   Here’s one article that reminds us to ensure we are risk aware and maintain an intelligently adusting protection strategy.     Posted at Seeking Alpha by Michael T. Synder   http://seekingalpha.com/article/274478-the-next-crash-could-be-a-lot-worse

The Next Crash Could Be Alot Worse

here’s a lot of emotion in this market at the moment, and the conversations among traders are nearly all leaning toward the bear side

So what are some of the signs that this downturn on Wall Street may turn into a full-blown crash?

Well, according to the Wall Street Journal, junk bonds are being sold off at an alarming rate right now. Does the following quote from the Journal remind anyone of 2008 at least a little bit?….

A steep decline in prices of bonds backed by subprime mortgages has spread through the riskiest segments of the credit markets, ending rallies in high-yield corporate bonds and commercial real-estate debt.

Also, many of the big Wall Street banks are already laying off workers. In a previous article I wrote about the potential for Wall Street to go into “panic mode“, I noted that Goldman Sachs (GS), Bank of America (BAC), JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Morgan Stanley (MS) are all laying people off or are considering staff cuts.

The truth is that the big banks on Wall Street are not nearly as stable as most people think that they are. Moody’s recently warned that it may downgrade the debt ratings of Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo.

Another major story on Wall Street right now is oil. OPEC recently announced that oil production levels will not be raised, even though the price of oil has been hovering around $100 a barrel.

World oil supplies are very tight right now. In fact, the globe actually consumed 5 million barrels per day more oil than it produced during 2010. This was possible because the difference was apparently made up by drawing down reserves.

But if oil supplies are this tight already, what is going to happen if a major war (as opposed to all of the minor wars that are already happening) erupts in the Middle East?

The world is sitting on the edge of a financial disaster.

It is important to keep in mind that Europe is also in far worse financial condition than it was just prior to the financial collapse of 2008.

It is being reported that German finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble is convinced that a “full-blown” financial meltdown by Greece is a very real possibility. The cost of insuring Greek debt has soared to a brand new record high, and officials all over Europe are in panic mode.

But financial problems are not just happening in Greece. The largest bank in France has just cut in half the amount of cash that customers can withdraw from ATMs each week.

Most Americans don’t spend much time thinking about the financial condition of Europe, but the truth is that what happens in Europe is going to play a major role in the months and years ahead.

Of course most Americans already know that the U.S. government is a financial mess.

As the “debt ceiling deadline” of August 2nd draws closer, the U.S. government has been raiding retirement funds in order to stay under the debt limit.

Many investors are quite nervous about what may happen if the U.S. government actually does start defaulting on debt on August 2nd.

Others claim that the U.S. government is already in default.

The only Chinese agency that gives credit ratings on sovereign debt says that the U.S. government “has already been defaulting” and the Chinese government has been repeatedly warning that the U.S. needs to get its finances in order.

In any event, this debt ceiling drama will get resolved one way or another.

The bigger question is this….

How is the U.S. government going to respond when the next financial crash happens?

Back in 2008, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. government took unprecedented steps to prop up Wall Street.

But can they really do that again if we see another major crash in 2011 or 2012?

Many believe that things will be totally different this time around. Just check out what Jim Rogers recently told CNBC….

“The debts that are in this country are skyrocketing,” he said. “In the last three years the government has spent staggering amounts of money and the Federal Reserve is taking on staggering amounts of debt.

“When the problems arise next time…what are they going to do? They can’t quadruple the debt again. They cannot print that much more money. It’s gonna be worse the next time around.”

Jim Rogers is right about that.

The next time we see a collapse on the scale of 2008 it is going to be a much bigger mess.

Global financial markets are extremely vulnerable right now and there are a whole host of potential “tipping points” which could push them over the edge.

The Federal Reserve and the U.S. government more or less used up all of their ammunition on the 2008 crisis.

If we see another collapse in 2011 or 2012 there is not going to be much of a safety net available.

The entire world financial system is simply swamped with way too much debt. The world has never seen anything even remotely close to the gigantic mountains of debt that have been accumulated around the world today.

The current global financial system is not sustainable. More crashes are inevitable. A lot of people are going to get steamrolled.

Hopefully you will not be one of them

Read more here:
The Next Crash Could Be Alot Worse

HERE IS YOUR FOOTER

Lots of pessimism since QE2 is deemed a failure and no QE3 is coming.   Here’s one article that reminds us to ensure we are risk aware and maintain an intelligently adusting protection strategy.     Posted at Seeking Alpha by Michael T. Synder   http://seekingalpha.com/article/274478-the-next-crash-could-be-a-lot-worse

The Next Crash Could Be Alot Worse

here’s a lot of emotion in this market at the moment, and the conversations among traders are nearly all leaning toward the bear side

So what are some of the signs that this downturn on Wall Street may turn into a full-blown crash?

Well, according to the Wall Street Journal, junk bonds are being sold off at an alarming rate right now. Does the following quote from the Journal remind anyone of 2008 at least a little bit?….

A steep decline in prices of bonds backed by subprime mortgages has spread through the riskiest segments of the credit markets, ending rallies in high-yield corporate bonds and commercial real-estate debt.

Also, many of the big Wall Street banks are already laying off workers. In a previous article I wrote about the potential for Wall Street to go into “panic mode“, I noted that Goldman Sachs (GS), Bank of America (BAC), JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Morgan Stanley (MS) are all laying people off or are considering staff cuts.

The truth is that the big banks on Wall Street are not nearly as stable as most people think that they are. Moody’s recently warned that it may downgrade the debt ratings of Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo.

Another major story on Wall Street right now is oil. OPEC recently announced that oil production levels will not be raised, even though the price of oil has been hovering around $100 a barrel.

World oil supplies are very tight right now. In fact, the globe actually consumed 5 million barrels per day more oil than it produced during 2010. This was possible because the difference was apparently made up by drawing down reserves.

But if oil supplies are this tight already, what is going to happen if a major war (as opposed to all of the minor wars that are already happening) erupts in the Middle East?

The world is sitting on the edge of a financial disaster.

It is important to keep in mind that Europe is also in far worse financial condition than it was just prior to the financial collapse of 2008.

It is being reported that German finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble is convinced that a “full-blown” financial meltdown by Greece is a very real possibility. The cost of insuring Greek debt has soared to a brand new record high, and officials all over Europe are in panic mode.

But financial problems are not just happening in Greece. The largest bank in France has just cut in half the amount of cash that customers can withdraw from ATMs each week.

Most Americans don’t spend much time thinking about the financial condition of Europe, but the truth is that what happens in Europe is going to play a major role in the months and years ahead.

Of course most Americans already know that the U.S. government is a financial mess.

As the “debt ceiling deadline” of August 2nd draws closer, the U.S. government has been raiding retirement funds in order to stay under the debt limit.

Many investors are quite nervous about what may happen if the U.S. government actually does start defaulting on debt on August 2nd.

Others claim that the U.S. government is already in default.

The only Chinese agency that gives credit ratings on sovereign debt says that the U.S. government “has already been defaulting” and the Chinese government has been repeatedly warning that the U.S. needs to get its finances in order.

In any event, this debt ceiling drama will get resolved one way or another.

The bigger question is this….

How is the U.S. government going to respond when the next financial crash happens?

Back in 2008, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. government took unprecedented steps to prop up Wall Street.

But can they really do that again if we see another major crash in 2011 or 2012?

Many believe that things will be totally different this time around. Just check out what Jim Rogers recently told CNBC….

“The debts that are in this country are skyrocketing,” he said. “In the last three years the government has spent staggering amounts of money and the Federal Reserve is taking on staggering amounts of debt.

“When the problems arise next time…what are they going to do? They can’t quadruple the debt again. They cannot print that much more money. It’s gonna be worse the next time around.”

Jim Rogers is right about that.

The next time we see a collapse on the scale of 2008 it is going to be a much bigger mess.

Global financial markets are extremely vulnerable right now and there are a whole host of potential “tipping points” which could push them over the edge.

The Federal Reserve and the U.S. government more or less used up all of their ammunition on the 2008 crisis.

If we see another collapse in 2011 or 2012 there is not going to be much of a safety net available.

The entire world financial system is simply swamped with way too much debt. The world has never seen anything even remotely close to the gigantic mountains of debt that have been accumulated around the world today.

The current global financial system is not sustainable. More crashes are inevitable. A lot of people are going to get steamrolled.

Hopefully you will not be one of them

Read more here:
The Next Crash Could Be Alot Worse

HERE IS YOUR FOOTER