WEBVTT - The Mark Moss Show 1-29-24 0:00:01.520 --> 0:00:04.720 All right, Andy Sheckman, President, Miles Franklin. 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:08.119 You're the gold guy, but you're bigger than the Gold guy. 0:00:08.520 --> 0:00:11.160 You talk a lot about the massive amounts of debt 0:00:11.200 --> 0:00:13.600 that we have going on in the country, the impact 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:17.200 of what that debt is doing, the impact of other 0:00:17.320 --> 0:00:20.319 nations moving to gold, you know, the bricks nations, all that. 0:00:20.320 --> 0:00:21.840 We've done a bunch of shows together. Anyway, Thanks for 0:00:21.880 --> 0:00:22.680 joining me, Andy. 0:00:23.360 --> 0:00:25.800 Yeah, Mark, great to be here, buddy, Thanks for having me. Yeah. 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.480 You're always a wealth of information and I love your 0:00:28.680 --> 0:00:32.559 passion and energy you have on these topics. So I 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:36.720 want to talk about twenty twenty four, what you think 0:00:36.800 --> 0:00:42.280 is going on this year, and maybe we'll talk about, 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:44.560 you know, how we think we get through this year 0:00:45.040 --> 0:00:48.000 with like three big critical events that I see that 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:51.959 we're dealing with. One, the massive amounts of debt, not 0:00:52.080 --> 0:00:54.880 just the United States has, but basically every nation has, 0:00:55.040 --> 0:00:58.840 I mean unsustainable debt. But then we have in the 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:02.200 United States, we have a year and that's sure to 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:04.000 cause some fireworks and volatility. 0:01:04.600 --> 0:01:05.319 And then we have. 0:01:05.440 --> 0:01:08.319 The looming threat of war, and we have war. It's 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:11.280 not a threat of war, we have war, but potentially escalating. 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:13.640 So those kind of I kind of want to walk 0:01:13.640 --> 0:01:16.679 through that framework. But you know, you're you're the gold guy. 0:01:16.720 --> 0:01:18.200 But like I said, not just goal, but you know, 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:20.040 bricks and currencies and all of that. 0:01:21.000 --> 0:01:23.920 Okay, So let's start real quick by just sort. 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:27.360 Of recapping twenty twenty three and what happened in twenty 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:28.800 twenty three. I know there was a lot of talk 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.319 about the Bricks launching a new currency in August, the 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:34.480 death of the dollar, all of these things. So let's 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:36.480 talk about twenty twenty three and how it shaped up 0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:38.679 versus kind of what you thought or how we got 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:39.080 through that. 0:01:40.560 --> 0:01:44.280 Sure, Well, you know, look, James Ricords is someone I 0:01:44.319 --> 0:01:47.800 respect an awful lot, and I had the good fortune 0:01:47.840 --> 0:01:49.840 of actually spending a little bit of time with him 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:54.400 before the August meeting, chatting with him about his theories, 0:01:54.440 --> 0:01:57.320 and I agree with everything he said. I think the 0:01:57.400 --> 0:02:02.320 mistake he made was picking time saying that the Johannesburg 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:06.920 meeting in August of last year, where the Bricks had 0:02:06.920 --> 0:02:12.520 their meeting, would bring about not only a unified currency, 0:02:12.560 --> 0:02:16.400 a settlement currency backed by commodities. As we've been told 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:19.160 by the Russian Finance minister over and over and over again, 0:02:19.200 --> 0:02:21.880 will happen. But he also said something that I've been 0:02:21.919 --> 0:02:23.880 saying for over three years, and that is that we 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:28.640 will see a unification of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and 0:02:28.680 --> 0:02:31.320 the Eurasian Economic Union with the Bricks. They're in essence 0:02:31.360 --> 0:02:35.360 the same countries and aligned very much the same, and 0:02:35.400 --> 0:02:38.280 I believe that will happen. In fact, right before the 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:41.560 end of the year, the President of Belarus called for this. 0:02:41.639 --> 0:02:44.040 He said, we need to get these groups together. We 0:02:44.120 --> 0:02:48.560 all have the same interests. And even though the Bricks 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:54.080 did not come out and issue this unified currency, it 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:56.200 doesn't matter to me. In fact, what they said was 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:59.640 let's have the finance ministers go back to the drawing 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:02.919 board and present their findings. In the twenty twenty four 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:07.320 meeting in Russia, one of two hundred Bricks meetings that 0:03:07.360 --> 0:03:09.960 we will see over the course of twenty twenty four 0:03:10.560 --> 0:03:16.520 in Russia, but we did see five countries formally apply 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:21.600 and formally be accepted. Six applied, five were accepted, or 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:25.359 I guess we could say. Argentina was asked to join 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:29.200 and they were going to but the new administration declined. 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:31.760 So we saw Egypt in Iran and the United Arab 0:03:31.800 --> 0:03:35.040 Emirates and Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia, and these are big. 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:39.040 These are very big. Of course, with UAE and with 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:42.400 Saudi Arabia that's as big as it gets. With Ethiopia 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:46.560 the fastest growing economy in Africa, very very resource rich, 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:50.520 Egypt with its strategic shipping lines, the Straits of Hormuz 0:03:51.040 --> 0:03:56.520 and the Red Sea, and of course you know, if 0:03:56.560 --> 0:04:02.360 we look at this coalestion in terms of its significance 0:04:02.400 --> 0:04:05.480 with energy, I think it is huge. And when we 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:07.720 talk a little bit about what's happened so far this year, 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:09.840 I'll talk to you about what the United Arab Emirates did. 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:11.880 And I think it's the biggest shot across the bow. 0:04:12.680 --> 0:04:15.200 But it's big, and I don't think the fact that 0:04:15.240 --> 0:04:20.080 these things didn't happen immediately is a big deal. In fact, 0:04:20.160 --> 0:04:22.400 I think it adds credibility to the Bricks. I think 0:04:22.440 --> 0:04:25.080 the people in the West think that instant gratification is 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:28.960 not fast enough. And if anything, look, this has been 0:04:29.000 --> 0:04:31.680 a seventeen year deal with the Bricks. This hasn't just 0:04:31.760 --> 0:04:35.200 come out of nowhere, and they're doing things methodically, and 0:04:35.240 --> 0:04:39.120 they are doing things I believe well thought out, and 0:04:39.160 --> 0:04:42.839 I think This plays into Brett Johnson's milkshake theory, which 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:45.839 I agree with. The dollar is still the strongest currency. 0:04:46.240 --> 0:04:49.480 Until it's not. This will be death by a thousand cuts, 0:04:49.520 --> 0:04:51.359 little by little, by little by little. I call it 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:54.760 logarithmic decay, little by little, by little, by little by little. Bang. 0:04:54.800 --> 0:04:57.760 At some point we see things shift. And it wasn't 0:04:57.760 --> 0:04:59.640 in twenty twenty three, and it may or may not 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:02.080 be in twenty twenty four. But what I do see 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:06.560 is a growing legitimacy to where now we've seen thirty 0:05:06.600 --> 0:05:11.760 countries thirty formally apply to this growing legitimacy, this growing 0:05:11.839 --> 0:05:15.240 union of countries pushing back against the West. So as 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:17.760 far as bricks are concerned, Mark, I think that twenty 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:21.080 twenty three was a big year. I think twenty twenty 0:05:21.080 --> 0:05:22.800 four will be a bigger year. But all I can 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:25.040 tell you is that in my mind, I believe at 0:05:25.080 --> 0:05:28.520 some point we see that all at once moment, when 0:05:28.640 --> 0:05:31.440 enough countries have joined together in the crypto space, I 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:34.320 guess you would call it mass adoption. And I don't 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:36.719 think we've seen mass adoption yet. But you add thirty 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:39.960 more countries to now ten, with another twenty that have 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:43.880 informally applied. We're beginning to get to that mass adoption 0:05:44.040 --> 0:05:47.600 moment in GDP and military might and oil and gas 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:52.560 production and all energy production and critical resources, everything, human population, 0:05:52.640 --> 0:05:55.960 you name it. And at that point, I think it 0:05:56.040 --> 0:06:00.120 becomes not only more likely, but much more credible that 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:01.400 we see something like that happen. 0:06:01.600 --> 0:06:01.920 Yeah. 0:06:01.960 --> 0:06:03.400 I like what you said about the death by a 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:07.920 thousand cuts. I think that's certainly kind of where we're at. 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:11.480 And I like to say, and I typically say, all 0:06:11.520 --> 0:06:13.159 this is a process. 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:13.320 Not an event. 0:06:13.800 --> 0:06:16.839 And to your point about people looking for instant gratification. 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:18.960 You know, when the dollar took over the reserve standard 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:21.719 from the sterling one hundred years ago, I mean that 0:06:21.800 --> 0:06:24.760 was about a forty year. Process just doesn't happen over 0:06:24.800 --> 0:06:26.240 It doesn't happen in a couple of years. It doesn't 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:29.360 happen a decade. It's multiple decades. And so the thousand 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:31.880 cuts is sort of that process that we're seeing. We 0:06:31.960 --> 0:06:34.159 do know that we've seen nations. I mean, if you 0:06:34.160 --> 0:06:36.120 follow Luke Grammin's work, which I'm sure you do, and 0:06:36.160 --> 0:06:38.960 I've had them on the show several times, we do 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:42.080 see that they have been using less US treasuries and 0:06:42.080 --> 0:06:44.839 they've been moving to gold as a reserve for example, 0:06:45.120 --> 0:06:47.680 so not as a medium of exchange, but certainly as 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:49.320 a store of value, reserve asset. 0:06:50.480 --> 0:06:52.400 Well, let me comment on that real quick, and I'm 0:06:52.400 --> 0:06:53.920 glad you brought that up. I'm a big fan of 0:06:53.960 --> 0:06:57.479 Lukey's one smart guy for sure. You know, you look 0:06:57.520 --> 0:07:00.599 at gold since the beginning of two thousand, you know, 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:03.320 go all the way back, and you see the SNP 0:07:03.560 --> 0:07:08.320 appreciate by seven percent per year. You see gold appreciate 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:11.360 on average by seven point eight percent per year, and 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:14.400 it's really in terms of its percentage, it's destroyed the 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:17.440 bond market. And if you look just over the last 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:21.720 few years in terms of what we've seen in gold's appreciation. 0:07:22.400 --> 0:07:24.720 In twenty twenty, the price of gold, let me give 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:27.920 you the exact number here in twenty twenty, the price 0:07:27.920 --> 0:07:33.320 of gold on average was Bear with me one second. 0:07:33.360 --> 0:07:37.360 Here we go seventeen seventy three in twenty that's twenty twenty, 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:40.280 excuse me, twenty twenty one, seventeen ninety eight average price, 0:07:40.680 --> 0:07:44.440 twenty twenty two, eighteen oh one, twenty twenty three, nineteen 0:07:44.560 --> 0:07:47.440 forty three. So you go all the way back to 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:49.720 the beginning of the century, with the exception perhaps of 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:52.360 a gain in bitcoin. I know, I know you have 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:56.160 strong feelings about bitcoin, and I don't have any negative 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:59.640 feelings about bitcoin whatsoever. But just speaking in terms of 0:07:59.680 --> 0:08:03.040 traditional assets, gold has been the tortoise, not the hair. 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:07.880 And when you think about it in terms of using 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:11.720 gold to replace the function of treasuries, look, I think 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:17.520 what gold offers is trust, and it's transparent trust. Whereas 0:08:17.560 --> 0:08:22.160 you could argue with what's been going on with the US, 0:08:22.320 --> 0:08:25.800 we are beginning, perhaps in some people's eyes, to lack 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:27.440 a little bit of trust. When we look at the 0:08:27.480 --> 0:08:31.320 bond market, they said in twenty twenty three that gold 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:33.680 it was the first time in forty five years that 0:08:34.520 --> 0:08:37.640 gold had less volatility than the ten year treasury. So 0:08:38.320 --> 0:08:42.880 I think it's completely logical for countries to shed treasuries 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:47.040 which have volatility issued by a country that perhaps is 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:49.080 lacking a little bit of trust and appears to be 0:08:49.160 --> 0:08:54.160 choosing inflation over austerity. I truly do believe that that 0:08:54.280 --> 0:08:56.920 is a growing trend. You will see countries like China, 0:08:57.080 --> 0:08:59.400 like Saudi Arabia, like all these countries that are shedding 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:02.760 treasuries and look at the numbers. Twenty twenty three was 0:09:02.760 --> 0:09:06.520 the and twenty twenty two both biggest years ever one 0:09:06.559 --> 0:09:09.960 after the other central bank purchasing in history. So yeah, 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:12.400 it appears. I think Loop's right. I think they are 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:18.160 selling treasury slowly and accumulating gold as a form of 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:20.760 a substitute, if you will, for a treasury and go 0:09:20.800 --> 0:09:23.320 back to the beginning of the century. And it really 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:27.720 does really kind of fit that bill in terms of safe, secure, 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:32.040 no counter party risk, and watching it appreciated a slow, 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:37.480 steady growth. I think the concept of using a government 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.200 or a foreign government's debt as an asset from a 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:45.120 historical context as but a very brief history. Gold not 0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:47.200 so brief, and I think we're kind of going full circle. 0:09:47.280 --> 0:09:50.200 Yeah, it's almost ridiculous when you think about that, using 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:53.440 another country's debt as a reserve asset, if you will. 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:56.680 And so this is what I see as a bigger 0:09:56.679 --> 0:09:58.640 shift going on, right, And I'm sure you would agree. 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:01.840 And this is what Luke points to a neutral reserve asset. 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:03.480 I mean, that's basically what you're just saying, right, It's 0:10:03.520 --> 0:10:06.679 like a neutral reserve asset. And so a lot of 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:08.520 people say that, you know, you can't replace the dollar. 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:11.160 That would definitely be Brent Johnson's argument, and I'm going 0:10:11.240 --> 0:10:13.400 to have him on later to to make that case. 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:16.559 You can't just replace the dollar, you know, the swift system, 0:10:16.640 --> 0:10:19.400 the correspondent banks, the deep bond market, et cetera, et cetera. 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:20.520 You can't. 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:23.560 And they're absolutely right. And Russia isn't going to replace 0:10:23.600 --> 0:10:25.319 the bond market. China's not going to replace the US 0:10:25.400 --> 0:10:28.600 bond market. But gold is eating. 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:28.800 Away at that. 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:33.200 And I think this illustrates a much bigger shift the 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:34.640 one that I hit on all the time, which is 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:37.840 the sort of this decentralized revolution, sort of the pendulum 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:42.240 swinging back from sixty eighty years of centralization and now 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:46.280 going back to decentralization. So the days of the dollar 0:10:46.320 --> 0:10:49.480 homogeny are sort of over, and now each nation not 0:10:49.520 --> 0:10:52.079 wanting to trust each other, the. 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:53.160 Bricks nations, you know. 0:10:53.280 --> 0:10:56.679 As far as the currency, or specifically a reserve asset, 0:10:56.679 --> 0:10:58.080 I'm not so sure about that because I think that 0:10:58.120 --> 0:11:01.080 trust is gone, which is why that neutral reserve asset, 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:03.040 like a gold reserve asset, sort of makes sense. 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:07.400 Well, my take on that has always been, you know, 0:11:07.440 --> 0:11:10.440 people say that trust and I wonder I look at 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:12.720 what's happening in this country, and I say, are we 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:15.520 really trusted anymore? I mean we trusted the way we 0:11:15.640 --> 0:11:18.040 really once were. Is this the country that you and 0:11:18.080 --> 0:11:20.280 I when we were kids in the seventies and eighties? 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:22.240 Is this really the country we grew up in? I 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:25.960 would say, no respect for authority, all of that stuff, 0:11:26.000 --> 0:11:29.560 the open borders, the you know, blindfolded lady liberty holding 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:31.760 the scales of justice. And I don't care what side 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:33.680 of the aisle you're on, can you argue that the 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:36.960 current and the previous administrations have been treated equally? All 0:11:37.000 --> 0:11:41.680 of these things that made this country great, religion, nuclear family, 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:44.800 you know, all of these things seem to be questioned 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:48.120 right now. And I would say to you that the 0:11:48.120 --> 0:11:50.640 way that this works go back to what Zoltan Posar 0:11:50.679 --> 0:11:54.160 has been saying. Breton Woods three. I think we've talked 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:56.840 about this briefly. Where Bretton Woods won at the end 0:11:56.880 --> 0:11:58.679 of World War Two. As you just mentioned, we took 0:11:58.720 --> 0:12:01.800 over for the pound sterling the loose Bretton Woods too, 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:04.199 and when we closed the gold window and then became 0:12:04.240 --> 0:12:07.280 the petro dollar, and now a system that will be, 0:12:07.320 --> 0:12:13.280 according to Zoltan backed or described or predicated on commodities 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:17.240 and transparency. And this is the marriage of blockchain technology 0:12:17.280 --> 0:12:19.640 and commodities, and I think that's what the Russian finance 0:12:19.679 --> 0:12:23.160 minister is getting at. And I agree, you don't need 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.320 to replace the reserve status of the dollar to massively 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:29.520 chip chip chip chip chip, chip away at the settlement 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:32.680 status of the dollar. And I think Jim was very 0:12:32.720 --> 0:12:35.319 careful in his words that would be Jim Ricords when 0:12:35.360 --> 0:12:39.240 he said settlement common settlement currency. But you continue to 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:42.320 chip away at the settlement status of the dollar, at 0:12:42.360 --> 0:12:46.480 what point does it begin to dramatically affect the reserve 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:49.760 status of the dollar and the bond market and interest 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:54.440 rates and that unintended or maybe the intended corollary consequences, 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:58.360 And this is where gold comes in, or bitcoin, something 0:12:58.400 --> 0:13:03.160 that would act for these countries as an asset that 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:08.000 doesn't carry US counterparty liability, that would allow them to 0:13:08.040 --> 0:13:11.360 take their excess cash and put it into something that 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:15.360 would not only preserve its purchasing power, but potentially grow 0:13:15.720 --> 0:13:19.960 its purchasing power and in fact remove counterparty liability, whether 0:13:20.000 --> 0:13:23.920 it be US default liability, US inflation liability, or just 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:27.719 the risk of rates going higher in this system where 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:31.240 less and less and less settlement is being done in dollars, 0:13:31.280 --> 0:13:34.600 and all of those dollars slashing around make their way home, 0:13:34.960 --> 0:13:37.439 creating more and more and more inflation, which leads to 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:39.720 higher rates. And this is just a vicious circle. But 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:42.120 I agree, and I want people to know. I mean, 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:43.640 a lot of people would say Brett and I are 0:13:43.640 --> 0:13:45.840 on the opposite side of the table. In some respects, 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:48.600 we are, but in most respects we're not. Because I 0:13:48.679 --> 0:13:53.160 agree his premise is very logical. But there is coming 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:56.600 an inflection point. And I think the world looks at 0:13:56.600 --> 0:13:59.520 the dollar, the world looks at our policies. I mean, 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:02.599 right now, you got the Speaker of the House and 0:14:03.000 --> 0:14:07.200 the Senate talking about and the Biden administration backing not 0:14:07.320 --> 0:14:10.080 just the sanctioning of the Russian assets like we did 0:14:10.120 --> 0:14:13.960 with Iran, and we start giving them back their sanctioned assets, 0:14:14.520 --> 0:14:17.640 but now confiscating them and using them to fund the 0:14:17.679 --> 0:14:20.840 war in Ukraine because the Congress doesn't want to give 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:25.080 appropriations to more Ukraine funding. You cross that line of 0:14:25.600 --> 0:14:31.040 not just sanctioning under the guise of law, but actually 0:14:31.080 --> 0:14:34.800 confiscating and using against that country. And now the whole 0:14:34.840 --> 0:14:39.680 world looks at the trust. Really, where's the trust? And 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:42.400 I think the world looks at the US very differently 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:45.720 in that respect. Again, the rule of law is the 0:14:45.800 --> 0:14:48.800 rule of law what it once was. Is Lady Liberty 0:14:48.840 --> 0:14:51.280 really blind or is she peeking out one eye? I 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:53.320 don't know, but I think the rest of the world 0:14:53.560 --> 0:14:56.360 could look at things that way, Mark, And so I 0:14:56.400 --> 0:15:01.280 think ultimately the settlement status of the dollar will ultimately 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:05.440 lead to the lack of use of the reserve status 0:15:05.480 --> 0:15:08.120 of the US bond market. And that, to me is 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:10.400 where things start to get a little bit murky. And 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:13.400 maybe that's what the role that gold will ultimately play 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:17.520 in this new growing union of countries. But until then, 0:15:17.560 --> 0:15:20.120 Brent's right, until then, the dollar is still the king. 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:22.800 But you know one other thing I'd like to say, 0:15:22.840 --> 0:15:25.480 and you look at the lead economic advisor to the 0:15:25.560 --> 0:15:29.080 United States government, it's interesting a man named Jared Bernstein. 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:31.680 His whole thesis is removal of the world reserve currency, 0:15:31.720 --> 0:15:35.200 and his report dethrone king Dollar. So you look at 0:15:35.240 --> 0:15:36.960 the moves we've made around the globe and you have 0:15:37.000 --> 0:15:39.920 to ask yourself, I mean, was this intended? Could it 0:15:40.040 --> 0:15:42.280 or could it just be too stupid to be stupid. 0:15:42.320 --> 0:15:45.960 I don't know, but I do think in general the 0:15:46.760 --> 0:15:50.000 reserve status of the dollar will start to wane in 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:53.240 the face of more and more and more settlement outside 0:15:53.240 --> 0:15:53.640 the dollar. 0:15:55.160 --> 0:15:55.960 I think it's both. 0:15:56.040 --> 0:15:59.480 I think it's some intentional and some stupidity. It's probably 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:01.680 a common both. And what i'd say back to the 0:16:01.880 --> 0:16:06.160 dollar is still king dollar, king of what, king of currencies? Sure, 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:10.720 king of fiat currencies. Uh, but the king US dollars. 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.800 So we've seen, you know, I think it was Lebanon 0:16:13.880 --> 0:16:15.560 was the worst performing currency to the dollar. 0:16:15.800 --> 0:16:17.600 Maybe, I don't know. 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:20.840 Argent Jennezuela's probably good, Venezuela. 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:24.720 Argentina, they're all they're all competing, right, but they've all lost, 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:26.200 you know, big to the US dollar. 0:16:26.240 --> 0:16:28.000 But the US dollars lost big too. 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:31.440 The US dollars down sixty five percent to media and 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:34.040 US real estate, it's down about seventy percent to the 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:35.920 S and P five hundred, just down about one hundred 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:37.920 and seventy percent to bitcoin. It's down, right, it's down 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:40.200 to everything as well. So it's king of what, it's 0:16:40.280 --> 0:16:42.920 king of fiat currency's okay, but they're all sinking, right. 0:16:42.960 --> 0:16:45.520 It's the it's the slowest sinking ship, if you will. 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:51.240 Gold Uh, you know, is sort of back up to 0:16:51.320 --> 0:16:55.360 its previous all time high, but when you adjusted for inflation, 0:16:55.640 --> 0:16:58.960 it's actually nowhere, not well, I don't want to say nowhere, 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:01.120 but it's certainly not act to it's all time high. 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:03.080 So you have to kind of take that into consideration. 0:17:03.720 --> 0:17:05.440 But let's just jump gears a little bit. So let's 0:17:05.680 --> 0:17:09.160 if we're looking forward to twenty twenty four. As I said, 0:17:09.160 --> 0:17:11.320 there's these three critical events that I see that I 0:17:11.400 --> 0:17:13.840 think that are driving markets. So one is this massive 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:17.240 amount of debt that's sort of forcing the hand of governments. 0:17:17.920 --> 0:17:20.400 Then we have the election year, and then potentially war. 0:17:20.680 --> 0:17:22.560 So let's talk through each of those. I know you've 0:17:22.560 --> 0:17:24.320 talked a lot about the debt, the amount of debt 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:26.600 that the US government has and the assets they have 0:17:26.760 --> 0:17:30.680 to back this up, but the debt sort of puts 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:32.399 the government in this rock in a hard place. The 0:17:32.440 --> 0:17:35.560 government is overspending, so that means they need more debt. 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:38.959 The deficit spending is growing. How do you think that 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:41.640 affects this year twenty twenty four and even maybe into 0:17:41.640 --> 0:17:45.040 twenty twenty five. Do you think that this massive amount 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:46.840 of debt at some point is going to blow everything up. 0:17:46.840 --> 0:17:48.480 I think we'd both agree on that. At some point 0:17:48.480 --> 0:17:51.880 you just can't sustain that anymore. I don't think that 0:17:52.000 --> 0:17:55.600 happens this year, but I think to me it means 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:58.160 that they're going to continue spending in deficit, which means 0:17:58.200 --> 0:18:01.480 the markets will and will probably keep humming along in 0:18:01.520 --> 0:18:04.080 an inflationary type environment. But what's your take on that? 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:04.920 What do you think the debt? 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:08.159 That's what I mean. Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm sorry to 0:18:08.200 --> 0:18:12.560 interrupt you there. Yeah, but that's yes. I agree with 0:18:12.640 --> 0:18:16.719 everything you just said. I really do. And look in 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:20.080 terms of the debt, let's just first quantify it. Most 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:25.359 people mark nowadays. I don't think it's unrealistic for people 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:27.960 to expect to make a million dollars in their lifetime. 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:31.800 Most of us will if you work long enough. And 0:18:31.960 --> 0:18:35.119 we see all sorts of billionaires around us, So you know, 0:18:35.760 --> 0:18:39.760 the number trillion sounds a lot like a million and 0:18:39.840 --> 0:18:41.600 a billion and can't be that big. But let's just 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:45.800 first baseline it and say, for definition purposes, a trillion 0:18:45.840 --> 0:18:49.160 seconds ago was thirty one, six and eighty eight years ago. 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:53.119 That's first and foremost. Who got Neanderthals walking around the 0:18:53.200 --> 0:18:57.240 planes of Europe a trillion seconds ago. That's one trillion 0:18:57.280 --> 0:19:00.440 seconds ago. And it took I don't know, like hundred 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:03.840 and thirty years to accumulate our first two trillion dollars 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:06.720 in debt. Yet if you go back to January one 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:10.720 of twenty twenty three, we are at thirty one point 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:14.480 four trillion dollar debt, and you go to January one 0:19:16.560 --> 0:19:19.760 of this year and we're at thirty four trillion plus. 0:19:19.800 --> 0:19:22.879 We've grown by two point six trillion dollars. Over the 0:19:22.920 --> 0:19:26.040 course of the twenty twenty three calendar year, we saw 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:30.320 nine hundred billion dollars in gross interest payments. And I 0:19:30.920 --> 0:19:34.600 think this is the point where I think we start 0:19:34.640 --> 0:19:38.399 to bring the milkshake theory or the dollar bowl theory 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:41.679 into focus. And it is simply this. The Congressional Budget 0:19:41.720 --> 0:19:45.399 Office tells us by their own estimation, and they're always wrong. 0:19:45.640 --> 0:19:50.520 They're going to be way way more I think, lenient 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:53.560 on the facts then we could really expect to see. 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:56.800 But they're telling us by their own admission that by 0:19:56.920 --> 0:20:01.359 twenty thirty one, in seven years, one hundred percent of 0:20:01.440 --> 0:20:04.000 all tax revenue will go just to pay the interest 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:08.800 on the debt and a mandatory entitlement spending like Social Security. 0:20:08.840 --> 0:20:11.720 Now social Security is off balance sheet, it's about seventy 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:15.480 trillion in the whole seventy trillion, and you add in 0:20:15.560 --> 0:20:18.320 Medicare and Medicaid and government military pensions, we're about one 0:20:18.359 --> 0:20:20.399 hundred and thirty hundred and forty trillions so or but 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:23.520 somewhere between one hundred and fifty and two hundred trillion 0:20:23.560 --> 0:20:26.520 dollars in debt. But ask yourself, is how is it 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:30.000 that we can expect to be the dominant financial and 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:32.760 military power in the world when in less than seven years, 0:20:33.400 --> 0:20:37.200 one hundred percent of all discretionary spending, which includes military, 0:20:37.200 --> 0:20:39.560 will need to be borrowed. Why would anyone want to 0:20:39.600 --> 0:20:43.600 borrow us money? A country that will inflate will choose inflation. 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.800 And I think that's becoming obvious because of all of 0:20:46.800 --> 0:20:49.280 the obligations we have, both on balance sheet and off 0:20:49.359 --> 0:20:50.880 who the hell's going to pay for them? Let alone 0:20:50.920 --> 0:20:53.400 the ten million people who who have just walked into 0:20:53.400 --> 0:20:56.159 this country, mostly illegally. Who's going to pay for their 0:20:56.200 --> 0:20:58.439 schooling and their housing and their medical and what's going 0:20:58.480 --> 0:21:01.960 to happen to the wages of the American paying tax 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:04.480 paying Americans who are these low income jobs that are 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:08.119 now going to be much lower pay offer salaries because 0:21:08.119 --> 0:21:10.920 you have all these immigrants looking for work. The whole 0:21:10.960 --> 0:21:14.680 situation is getting worse and worse, meaning the entitlements will 0:21:14.680 --> 0:21:17.679