Government Shutdown Hits Jobs — Yet Markets Keep Climbing?

Summary

• Precious Metals: Strong, explicit pitch for owning gold and silver as core hedges due to historic price surges, counterparty-risk protection, and institutional/central bank accumulation.
• Gold Revaluation: Detailed discussion of potential U.S. gold revaluation (e.g., to ~$3,500/oz) and its fiscal implications, signaling policy optionality and a possible regime shift.
• Silver Dynamics: Silver seen as strategic and supply-constrained, with evidence of paper-driven price suppression, Asian buying strength, and ETF purchase halts indicating tight physical markets.
• De-dollarization: Theme reinforced by central bank gold purchases, yuan-for-oil settlement and gold convertibility channels (Hong Kong/Saudi), and BRICS-linked alternatives undermining dollar dominance.
• AI: AI discussed as a dual-outcome driver (job displacement/UBI inflation vs. failure/deflation), with gold positioned as a hedge across both scenarios.
• China: Emphasis on China’s strategic positioning in manufacturing, energy linkages with Russia, and cultural/retail gold demand, contrasting with Western policy incoherence.
• Companies Mentioned: Nvidia (NVDA), Intel (INTC), Pfizer (PFE), and Walmart (WMT) cited in policy and AI contexts, not as investment pitches.
• Market Outlook: Weak ADP payrolls, contracting ISM components, and low consumer sentiment juxtaposed with buoyant equities; expectation of volatility and possible precious metals consolidation amid macro risks.

Transcript

Nothing in this program should be considered investment advice. It is for educational purposes only. Please hit pause and read this disclaimer in full. >> Because of the weaponization of the Swift's banking system, the weaponization of our currency, and all of these sanctions against anybody who doesn't bow the knee to what America expects to do has changed uh what the rest of the world seems to be putting their faith in right now. [Music] Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of FinanceU. I'm your host Dr. Chris Martinson here again with Paul Ker of Kiker Wealth Management. Hi Paul. Good to see you again. >> Hi Chris. Happy Thursday to you. >> Happy Thursday. Well, it's also happy day two of the US government shutting down. Um and we got to talk about this. Uh very little market reaction to this. you know, you see, you know, what is this shutdown? What's it about? Obvious uh political fractures. I suspect, Paul, that this is going to last a while. Um but, you know, I think this gentleman's position is not unreasonable. He says, "I want a government small enough to have neither the time nor resources to conduct a 5-hour raid over a pet squirrel." Um >> that is a reasonable goal. I think I think that's fair. Um yes. and and I looked in Poly Market and I found that Poly Market was thinking that I think I have it down here a little bit. Found it. Um Poly Market is betting uh or is this uh Kelchi market? Anyway, market participants are betting on about a 9 and a half day shutdown. Um we'll see. So things get painful pretty quick. You know, obviously it's it's one of those weird things. Do you ever you ever see Paul when like the PTA doesn't get its way and doesn't get the 5% increase it wants or 7% or whatever it wants. You know, they shut down the afterchool programs, the things that are designed to hurt the parents the most in their daily lives, right? They don't fire like an assistant, associate, vice dean of whatever, you know, they they they just Yeah, they would never do that. So, um I feel like with the government shutdown, you know, it goes right at they hit you right away like national parks get closed, we can't pay our servicemen, please, you know. >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean it it's just kind of ridiculous. I mean, they're digging in on something, refusing to negotiate, trying to grandstand. And hey, it look, it's just the world we live in. You've got one side that's going to throw all the fits in the world and cause as much pain to the average uh citizen to get what they think should be done instead of negotiating with the chosen representatives of the American people. >> So, what do you what do you think comes with this? I mean, we've been through several shutdowns. Uh, I don't really think anything much comes of these things, do they? >> No. I mean, if you look back through history, I mean, basically, I I cannot remember the statistics. I had them yesterday, but um, you know, we've had these shutdowns before. Uh, market doesn't seem to care about it if we pay attention to that. I guess they just assume that it's going to be, you know, print if things get bad or spin spin spin. So, you know, there's not really any historical pres precedent of a major calamity in the markets. Now, I'm curious to see what happens. I guess if they do stretch this out 30 or 60 days, we'll just see uh how much fat Trump has the ability to cut out of the government. So, but at this point, you know, all these rumors about mass firings and whatnot haven't taken place. >> Yeah, I I'll believe it when I see it. Um, you know, it's been a lot of more talk than action on all the things I seem to care about on the Trump side so far, >> right? Um, you know, very little consequences for people who clearly deserve consequences at the high levels and um things like that. Also, uh, we should note here that there's more and more signs. I think Trump just announced a couple days ago that we had a couple, he said, "We have a couple of our boomer subs hanging out off of Russia and that he authorized potentially using long range US weapons deep into Russia." Both of those were kind of like red lines for Russia. We'll see. They have also had many red lines that haven't turned out to be very red at all. But if war breaks out in Europe, we we've have more signs, too, that um France is trying to get a little something going. Who knows? There's something going with Russia. But if war breaks out, I can't see how this is good for anything except the money printers. They're going to have to print like crazy uh to try and, you know, counter all that. What do you think? >> Well, I think it's right. The war may be the excuse to print money for everybody just like they did in 2020. A lot of people forget that Trump was was in the White House when they were paying people more to stay at home than they were to continue to go back to work. I mean, they just flooded the whole system with with that money. And some of the inflation that came by was magnified by what the uh Biden administration did. >> But that swed the seeds for the inflation that we experienced down the road. And then the Biden administration just put fertilizer and water on top of it. And then unfortunately, you know, one of the things I was hoping that is Trump was going to do what he actually said he was going to do by being more fiscally responsible and now we're throwing more more f fertilizer on those seeds of potential inflation. So, so yeah, I don't I don't I mean, they only know one playbook at this point. You know, if war breaks out, hey, we can't let the markets go down. We're just going to print print print. And that just leads us closer to something breaking. And if the dollar breaks below 95, then that that makes it pretty easy to make decisions within the portfolio with some of the indications we're seeing from money flow right now. >> Well, so they're going to have to print. They're going to print a lot more. And that brings us, I think, kind of effortlessly into the part I want to talk about. You and I had a a phone call the other day because we were just asking this question. Is what is gold telling us in silver too I guess? Um but really gold what what is there a message in this? Because gold has been nothing but just sort of this you know very quick trip from just what's this 2500 to 38 you know 3900 almost there. Uh just this year. This is just this year. This is a Let's Let's be clear. Historically speaking, this is a historic move for gold. And it doesn't just do this for no reason. It's sending a message. So, could that message be, "Wow, there's going to be a lot of printing coming. There just has to be a lot of printing coming for whatever sets of reasons." But you and I both know that, well, that's the only playbook they know, >> right? >> And we're in trouble right now. So, let's discuss this. Um, what do you think gold is sending? What's the signal here? >> Well, it's telling us that there's that there's big money because look, this is just this the gold move, at least in the United States, is not US retail at this point. I mean, look, I've been this is what my 27th year, 28th year in the business. Gosh, I can't remember how long, but especially since 2004. >> Everybody that's a in the North Georgia area, really in a in a large radius, knows that I'm a proponent of gold and silver. I've had one call asking if I should if they should buy it. What I've had more calls of and this is still consistently happening as people in 2012 when we were getting a long-term sales signal. I was like, "Hey, you know, don't go all in on that." You know, you know, I you know, I would recommend that you wait. They're calling going, "Should I sell it today? Should I sell it today? Should I sell it today?" You know, so I'm I'm giving the advice, look, you got to be long-term oriented. You've waited all this period of time. Kind of let it go. So my concern is is that this is the relief valve for your major in you know crypto is the shiny object, right? Like it's the bait to pull us in. I don't know enough whether that's going to be the hedge that they expect it to be. But what I can tell you is that Wall Street's promoting it heavily. >> I'm to the point with ETF issuers and all that are sending emails on a consistent basis, you know, hey, look at our fund. You know, this is great for clients. It's it's great business idea to get new clients in the door. Nobody's sending anything about precious metals right now, even as strong as this run has been. So, I know it's telling us something, and we're not going to know exactly for six months out, because I believe this is big money that's moving. But I but I will say, I wish I could show it, but I don't have permission right now. Uh Luke Groman put together in his September 30th full report for your full subscribers. I read it last night, he's got a theory that that it's the hedge against both outcomes uh when it comes to AI. So he goes in and talks about how AI's, you know, all these companies like Walmart that are that are discussing how it's just going to absolutely change the workforce. So on the one hand, let's say AI is successful and it decimates a tremendous number of jobs. That's that's the expectation that these major corporations are out there. Well, you're going to have two things happen on that. Government's probably going to step up and do universal basic income. They're going to print money. the citizenry is going to demand it because a large part of the middle class has been wiped out and they're struggling anyway. And then you're also going to have companies that didn't move in there that are going to uh collapse from their debt. So it's inflationary protection on the extreme. The AI is successful and it's also lack of counterparty risk on the other side because if I'm a big investor right now and you see that things are untenable, valuations are at record high, you know, uh levered ETFs are through the roof. I mean, you know, we haven't even talked about the great taking potential with the derivatives market. Like, if the derivatives market comes apart, then that then there's going to be a lot of bankruptcies on the other side of that. So, gold has that protection because there's no creditors. There's no counterparty risk, especially if you're holding it physically. So, that's one outcome. On the other outcome, let's say AI fails, right? Oh, go ahead. Mhm. Well, I I just want I mean this is something I've I've said for a very long time because well, it's not my thought either is that gold is the only monetary asset that does not have counterparty risk. >> You might think, but Chris, what what if I own a big old stack of Benjamins in a safe, right? I have them. Where's the counterparty? Well, the counterparty is that's a Federal Reserve note and your counterparty is busy printing them like with abandon. So, it has counterparty risk, right? truly the the Federal Reserve when you get right down to it, Paul, is an insolvent institution. Like, if it had to operate as a normal institution, it's completely insolvent right now. Um, and it's losing money like crazy. >> Uh, the only only business I know where you can print money and still lose a couple hundred billion in a year. It's it's insane. But they'd managed um uh anything else, a stock, a bond, there somebody else is on the other side of that. A bank account particularly, you're an unsecured creditor. Most people don't know that. So when you strip all the gobbledygook away, you're down to JP Morgan's quote, which is only gold is money, all else is credit. Meaning, >> right, >> there's that counterparty there. So I just thought that it's worth like not just throwing that out there. I wanted everybody to understand. Gold is the only financial asset you can have where there's nobody on the other side of that, right? >> Yes. Yes. Well, and to put it in perspective, here's another way to explain that for the listeners out there. Your utility companies, right? When I, you know, a lot of your big firms are like, well, if you're concerned, just invest in your utility company because people have to pay their power bill. Well, that's true, right? But if a new technology comes out that's far cheaper and the government drops the regulation enough for that to come in or if we had a big deflationary event that occurred for two or three years, right? The the money gets sucked out, that utility company tends to carry a whole lot of debt that they could default on that debt and that stock could go to zero. you don't gold doesn't owe anybody anything on the other side of it. So you don't have that default risk with gold and and that's why it it's a good hedge against the extreme outcome on on either end of if let's say we had a deflationary holocaust. Now that's hard to imagine with their ability to print today like they have but let's just say everything unzipped and the price of everything goes down 80%. Well, most of your companies are going to go bankrupt because they're not going to be able to cash flow that their debts at that deflation. And debts are at a really high level both in households and corporations. People are levered to the hilt. That's what the Federal Reserve has forced. They've forced you to be levered to the hilt to try to maintain your purchasing power. Which reminds me, wasn't it Thomas Jefferson? Y'all, I need quotes up here because but but I lean on Chris because he remembers all of these things. It was Thomas Jefferson that said, "If you give control of the of your money over to the central banks first by inflation, which is what we've experienced, force you to be leveraged, then by deflation, they'll rob you of all your wealth." Well, on the other side of that, if we had a 80% decline, yeah, gold's going to go down 80%. But you don't have a creditor to default on that to take it. There's no counterparty risk. So you're going to maintain your purchasing power at either extreme. So that's what makes gold attractive uh as a hedge against an an uncertain time of where we are right now. And and what we're seeing is big institutions are moving in and retail is chasing crypto and and central banks of the world. What is it? The value of of gold on the central balance uh bank balance books now is actually above the the value of treasuries. So that tells you that that because of the weaponization of the swift banking system, the weaponization of our currency and all of these sanctions against anybody who doesn't bow the knee of what America expects to do has changed uh what the rest of the world seems to be putting their faith in right now. >> Well, it does indeed. I want to get to why I think that and remind me if I forget here why deflation is just not an option. Um and and we can talk about that in just a minute. But this I think gold is up what what did you say Paul? Yesterday 48% year on year to date. >> 48%. Yeah. Yeah. 48% year to date. >> Okay. So So that's a historically large move. I think it's telling us something for from my standpoint. It just when gold is going up like this very simply and I think I'll say it in fewer words than than um your recounting of Luke's bit is that it tells me that that big money is losing faith in the system. Mhm. >> Right. Gold is actually it's some people call it the anti-dollar, but you have to have faith in the dollar. I call it um it's it's the antirust trade, right? The less trust you have, the more gold you you end up owning. I've owned a lot of gold for a long time. I'm a very distrustful person um in the sense that I actually trust that the Federal Reserve is going to do the wrong thing for the most people most of the time because that's just who they are. They're going to print. They're going to print. They don't care how many middle- class families or lowerass families get wiped out. They just don't. Now, what's weird is ComX is stockpiling gold like its life depends on it. It's how I've titled it here. Um, this is a massive. This is the 202 just massive. Where did all that gold come from? That's 20 30. So, you picked up just a little over 22 million ounces of gold, which is a lot. Okay. >> Um, where'd that come from? Right. So, you don't just find 22 million ounces of gold lying around. I uh strongly suspect England, London is tapped out here, Paul. I think I think this came from the LBMA. I think they've lost the gold. We've imported it and now we got it. Um, and so the question is, well, why? Clearly, this has to be a, again, this is such big money we're talking about here. This has to be tied in with whatever Trump and Bent are up to. This feels like part of that to me. This is too big of a move to explain by um, you know, comics just deciding to put a little more on the shelves for some reason. Uh, it's way way beyond that. So, what do we see Trump and Bent doing? They're actually pretty pretty big moves here, right? Um, you know, I've described it. It kind of feels a little bit like a shakeddown, you know, like, hey, Nvidia, if you want to sell chips to uh China, you're going to have to give us a 15% vig. We need a little taste here at the home country. Intel, hey, we're going to take part of your company, right? Um, you know, for reasons. And uh that whole thing with Albert Borla um that Trump just did which caught me off guard a little bit saying you know what a great friend he is and now we're going to have Fizer like lower drug prices or something like that. Um but again with the government having an interest in all of that. So >> that you know if these things were happening under Biden I think more people would be saying hey that smells a little socialist like wait a minute government and corporations together is what's the actual definition of fascism? Right. It's it's a weird thing. >> That's right. >> And nobody's taken the time to sit down and say, "Hey, here's what we're doing and why." They just announced that they're doing the Intel, the Nvidia, the Fizer, the this, the Japan. They're doing all these deals. >> Mhm. >> Maybe it's good business, but from a governance standpoint, I'm a little concerned optically that that nobody's taking the time to say, "Here's how this makes sense within the construct of of how our nation is founded and settled and our legal and corporate structures." >> Right. I right maybe have you heard it? >> Uh I haven't heard any explanation as the reason why. So it leaves it completely open to speculation for market participants that are trying to figure it out. Maybe somebody knows. I don't know. You know I mean I I keep asking myself why would they do it? You when you talk about the the Fizer situation I couldn't see my goats when I actually yelled out loud by myself on the back porch and the dogs disappeared and my wife comes running out. What is it? And I'm like well read this. and she's like, "Oh, I get it now." So, but you know, I' I've wondered why in the world, okay, I've thought, why why are you taking stakes in these companies, especially when they come out and announce it's going to be critical minerals and, you know, all of the commodities and and you know, key components, you know, is it authoritarian? Is it fascism? Is it or or is it just the fact that they they realize we're at the end of this road? They've chosen to to develop a plan that's going to print us into oblivion and they're trying to to maneuver some of their assets best case scenario to protect some of the wealth of the US um treasury there for the future. That's that's the only positive outcome that I could come with that's not just complete blending of fascism between corporations actually finally get in their position of bought off enough leaders to to make that final move and and and stick their boot on the neck of the American people and wipe out the middle class for their own greed. >> Well, dark. Sorry. Well, but what if what if the you know the our Fort Knox audit didn't happen because they said they were going to do it and then somebody whispered in their ear and said there's not it's not it's most it's miss a lot of it's missing right this is roughly 10% of what's supposed to be held in total across all of the official stores that would be Fort Knox the um the mint and um uh Denver Mint and also down there at uh at the Naval Academy area. Right. So, so those are the those those are three big stores and this is about 10% of that. So, this is a big move. Maybe this is restocking. But what if gold plus the US accumulating as much as it can plus these deals we're just talking about, Paul? What if this is starting to coales into a pattern which says, "Hey, we're going to really reform the country and we're going we're going to at some point remonetize this gold, right?" Because it's being carried on the books right now officially at $42.22 an ounce. Mhm. >> Silver is worth more than that on I mean on the open market, right? So if they revalued gold just to I don't know pick a number 3500. Well now they get a trillion dollars that has to come out of the Federal Reserve that gets wired over to the Treasury and that's big money and you can do big exciting things with with that kind of a war chest for a while. As a reminder everybody that's only a half a year of deficits right now. It's not an infinite amount of money but still it would be an exciting amount of money I could imagine to team Trump. Oh yeah, absolutely. And one of the things I've always told clients because over the years when the when the Democrats are in control, somebody sends out an email to, you know, the the far-right Republicans or Republicans that, hey, the B administration is going to confiscate your 401k and put it in treasuries and people cash it out. And I'm like, look, we need to at least see it on the back page of the Wall Street Journal. I'm not saying that's the case, but historically, >> they're going to test the market and it's going to be on the back page of the Wall Street Journal, >> right? >> Well, Wall Street Journal is your propaganda piece as far as I'm concerned and everything that I can see. But when you've got Zero Hedge that's putting these articles out, you know, consistently in other places, is gold revaluation imminent and that trillion dollars that's coming in there, there's a, you know, as far as I'm concerned, that's back page of the Wall Street Journal. So, that's a potential that they could do. And I don't know if they could do it, you know, let's say the Democrats carry this government shutdown for a while. Do they do it to to bring some money into the general account? I don't understand the dynamics enough of what they can spend in a shutdown enough to speak, you know, confidently to that. >> Mhm. >> But but there's there's a lot of smoke around that potential there. And and look, you and I have talked about the unit before, but that's a methodical stepping forward. So, you know, I used to look at the search for news on the unit quarterly and now do it monthly. No major news that's come out here recently, but the bricks are still continuing to go forward with some type of alternative. And they've never backed off of the fact that they want 40% linking to whatever currency they come out with on the other side. So, it makes sense that the Trump administration, if they know that's coming, is going to have to find a way to link our currency to gold somehow. Um, I would think that would be a strategic move. So, revaluation of gold would be the first step. And hey, it gives him more money to spend. He likes to spend. So, it turns out China and Saudi Arabia have signed um a renmanb yuan. So, that's the Chinese offshore currency renmanb yuan settlement oil agreement. And China promised that the renman ban can be exchanged for gold. Hm. And um and then I heard that they're setting up another thing where they're setting up two offshore exchanges where you can change your renmanb if you have them into gold in both Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia turning Saudi Arabia into an external hub for this that again. So that's that's an implicit and explicit backing of their currency by gold saying hey anytime you want two major places you pick dial in you can take gold for for your for this currency. Um, it's not announced like that, but if it plays like it, then that's what it is. I mean, technically, you could convert your dollars into gold anytime, too, I guess. But, um, it does start to create the impression, Paul, that the dominance of the dollar is really being severely undermined, and that's always been something that's kicked off wars in the past. It we take it rather seriously. Um, that people do not mess with our dollar, particularly for oil. >> Yeah. Particularly for oil. >> Oil's been the lynch pin since Yeah. since Kissinger in 73 doing the petro dollar. It was genius move, but it's kind of an important lynch pin of our of our ability to project power in the world. And of course, that's what the story's always been about power, but >> it is, you know, and and Luke Groman had an interesting interview on microvoices uh maybe in the past month and and there's a lot of chatter around, you know, the question and we have to ask this question. the decisions we're making as a government have been making is undermined the value of the dollar is the global reserve currency right I mean there's no doubt that it's still the favored status around the world but it's slowly eroding around the way away so the question is are we reaching the point that this turns from slowly to suddenly and and it really looks like you know I if you question because we don't know the answer and we'll find out at some point in the future but gold's given a huge signal. I think with the big breakout we had about two years ago, two years a year and a half ago, you and I were talking about I don't know what this signal is, >> but it's a a signal and that has continued to build over time. So, so major moves are being made and look, you know, what was it June of this year, June 1st, gold's a tier one asset on on banks that hold it. So, it's being reinccorporated back into the financial system and and it doesn't look like there's anything stopping that at this point because, you know, protection of purchasing power is important and and the loss of purchasing power is incredibly is felt and seen by the average citizen. now probably you know a lot of conversations you're seeing the lag in and taxes going up and insurance going up and and across the board and it's it's an equal opportunity p punisher of the all except for those that are closest to the money printers that know what's coming >> well even those closest to the money printers turns out these are your in 2024 and I bet this chart's going to be interesting for 2025 when they finally make it >> but this is in 2024 so these are the top five central central bank buyers of gold in the bottom five top sellers of gold. Uh so Kazakhstan, Singapore, Thailand, Germany, Bolivia collectively sold 10, 20, 30, 31, 32. Um they they they collectively collectively sold less than China bought, right? But look at this. Poland, India, China, not I'm a little surprised Poland's top of the list. I would have thought I bet you anything with honest reporting, China's way at the top of this by a long shot. I think they are fibbers about how much gold they've officially bought. >> Oh yeah. >> Um but at any rate that so it was this it was the issuers. It was the printers themselves were buying a lot of gold. You know >> what does that tell you? Um the central banks. So it's it's what I just want to impress upon people here Paul that gold is sending a signal. Now we can guess we can speculate. We might have it entirely wrong. could be something nobody's thought of yet, but the signal is there and it's really obvious that uh this is big money. These are big players. It probably involves state players and you can feel the geopolitical dimensions. There's some kind of jockeying going on, you know. Um and and and that's sufficient signal for me to say, well, I'm uh I better pay for this play, you know, um pay for gold and and get it in my portfolio, pay attention to it. I'm a little worried too that it's maybe signaling that there's some kind of a monetary accident or a shakeup or some disruption coming that could lead to things like the great taking because it could mean there's counterparty risk out there. It could mean that there's some big banks that are in deeper trouble than we thought. It could be that the world has suddenly started to resolve the fact that all of Europe's kind of broke and it owes lots of money to itself in a big circle. And what happens with that? Um that's what I think gold is just telling us that this is a a very something really big powerful risk is lurking out there. >> Yes. Well and and this chart is not going to show it as well as I would like because um I would need to take the time which would take a little longer to pull it out. But what I'm showing here is a chart of just spot gold price end of day monthly going back to 1995. What I want to highlight is this area right here. So 2007 you had a consolidation and an absolute breakout in gold right before you had the the major worst part of the 2008 crisis. Now what why would somebody panic buying gold in that area? Now I know commodities were going up at the time but the average retail person wasn't really joining in on that. Retail didn't join until we got into this area right here. But what did we experience during that calamity financial crisis in 2008? You had a lot of defaults that occurred. So my question was was that many move compared to this move right here the recognition by some of those in power by you know spring of 2007 that counterparty risk is an issue and we want to own something that has no counterparty risk. So, you know, yeah, we had a a mini major deflationary event and they printed us into oblivion on the markets. But, you know, I I like to go back throughout history and look and say, okay, we had that happen right before the crisis unfolded uh uh in housing that kind of brought everything apart and how many bankruptcies and how many bailouts occurred during that short period of deflation that nearly took the system completely apart. I don't know if that's what it's telling us, but it sure is telling us to pay very close attention right now. And the interesting thing is the average person, the average person, now your listeners are educated, but the average person that's out there, you know, your listeners are lovers of truth. They're pursuing wisdom. They have the courage to follow the truth wherever it'll take them, is absolutely oblivious to what's taking place right now. Because unless they're Wall Street brokers calling them, telling them that they need to pay attention to this, they're chasing some other shiny object right now and and projecting the most recent returns in the market over the next 10 years about how wealthy they're going to be, you know, be and that may not necessarily be so with as fragile as the system is right now. >> Yeah. And I I just want to as well, so I know a lot of our listeners are US and Canadian and and Europe. Um, here in the US, if you want to go buy gold, you might go to a coin store in New York, you know, or something. Very typically, we we don't have like big shiny like places. Some of them are kind of dingy, you know, you go in and there's Lou behind the counter, you know, got some stuff in the display case and that's what it looks like. It's not like that. I was just talking uh with Michael Yan the other day and he's in in Thailand and he said that there was a half hour wait to get to the coin counter and they hustle you along. You know, you don't have a lot of time to sit there and go, "Well, let me look at all this stuff. They're just like, you know, you ready to buy or not cuz I got the guy behind you. He's got a stack of cash." He said just in the time that he was in line when Sakaco is his his wife um that 200 he saw $200,000 of gold leave, right? So this is this is what it looks like if you're in China >> at the retail level. Okay, >> this is what it looks like. Big shiny counters, display monitors up there showing the price of gold at any one moment in um yuan per gram uh because they're doing it by gram and it's just and there's just endless stock and people everywhere and it looks like this every single day. So it it's a whole different environment. So I just want people to be aware of that when we talk about gold and stuff here. They might talk about it a little bit. page C8, you know, in the Wall Street Journal, you know, kind of neutral to negative adjectives, you know, on the whole thing, >> you know, all of that. >> That's just how it is. So, so we have a very different relationship to it here. It is a cultural phenomenon in India, in Asia, in China in particular, but across, you know, Vietnam and and Thailand and Singapore. It's just a very different thing. But you would get a whole different perspective of it, wouldn't you? If you walked into a store and there's hundreds of people and they're all buying, you know, uh it just has a very very different flavor to it. Gold is how they save in those communities like that. It's not they're not there to buy it to get rich. They would love to get rich, of course. They're buying it because it's the it's the way they know how to save. >> Yes. >> Right. And they're big saving cultures. >> 30% typically. >> Yeah. You know, that looks like that looks like uh what Amazon orders would look like on any given day with things that depreciate in value >> when people are buying things they don't need to impress people they don't like. I >> mean, it's just endless, you know, just you just pull up so many videos and there are over um 8,000 stores just like this in just the Hube area um which is a big gold center. But you can walk into any one of 8,000 stores. There it is. are showing you the prices, endless amounts of ways to buy it, all fashioned beautifully, of course, but you're paying by the gram because you're buying gold, not jewelry. Um, so at any rate, so when we're talking gold, it is also a tale of two worlds. It it's what we see just mostly in prices over here in the West because people don't see that that social phenomenon of going into the store and everybody's doing it. You know, that has a different sort of a vibe. >> But the rest of the world is buying gold and silver to save, right? that that's how they prefer to save >> because it's their trusted asset. >> I mean it's I mean that they have experienced the bad part >> of uh the inflation government control is their trusted asset. >> I just like to keep in mind that that how the US treats and thinks and and talks about gold is not how the rest of the world does it. Totally different totally different vibes there. All right. Sven again for the says uh on a monthly chart gold is now has an RSI above 90. The last time we had a reading above 90 was 1980 and that was right before gold had a big old multi-deade correction. Um so RSI is the relative strength indicator just doesn't necessarily have to mean anything but typically that's where when you get up to these peaks that's where you see it go through its corrections. I will note that this peak in particular, see this one right here, >> this relative strength peak happened right when all of this advance happened. So, it doesn't necessarily always mean something, but it's a indicator that's worth paying attention to. >> Um, because it could consolidate or correct a bit. >> I'll be highly surprised if it doesn't consolidate or have a pretty nasty correction to shake some hands loose. Mhm. >> But one of the things that I pay attention to is is the RSI is setting a higher high. And from a long-term perspective, especially on the monthly, typically when you get into a top, and technical analysis just helps increase your odds is all it does. It doesn't predict what's going to unfold, but typically you'll have a consolidation pullback with a higher high, but a lower RSI across the board. And and that's in indicative of its losing underlying momentum. So, I I fully expect a pullback right now or at least a consolidation in gold unless we've got something imminent right around the corner. That's just an absolute financial catastrophe, right? >> But, um, you know, and we we just don't have enough information to see any of that out there right now. But, but, you know, for those that are in it, I'd say, you know, you're going to have to be ready to go through some volatility here. For those that aren't, maybe it's the time to be patient and and have the opportunity to buy some average in on consolidation or pullbacks. You know, not a recommendation, just educational as far as token. >> And again, just to round it out because silver is sort of the um step brother to to gold, >> however you look at that. Um so this is looking this is December silver. Um looking at it from a very long term. This is goes way back here to the um to the 80s here. uh this is the big peak in 2011. This would be an area where if if somebody was interested in in controlling the price of silver, which they have been, this would be a great time to get it back down and back under control. Um because something >> this this would be bad if it broke out way above that. So banging around the $48 mark is going to be an area we would have anticipated um some some attempts to get gold silver back down. And you know here it is just on a daily basis but look at it this morning today. This is uh October 2nd. So this it comes into the US market which is these blue these blue rectangles are a US market. You can just see boy just somebody sold a lot of what we call paper silver meaning this is just silver futures contracts being traded on comics drove the price down. It was all sell orders but this is what we've been seeing. So you see here it got sold hard in the US open market and then Asia bought and then it really didn't go anywhere in the US market and then Asia bought and then the US is going to sell it hard. So I think this is the US trying to reclaim some kind of pricing relevancy like we set the price. China just has been buying um whatever they can and they had to close down in China two of their silver ETFs. they just closed them down yesterday because they didn't couldn't find enough silver to support the buying that was coming into them. So in a silver ETF, if I buy a share, there has to be a corresponding amount of silver on the back side of that share. So they watch the shares getting purchased and then the ETF managers have to go out and get that silver. They couldn't do that. So they shut down um new purchases of additional shares. >> Yeah. And that's especially in the ones that can't use paper contracts on the other side of it that they're fully backed by silver. That's fascinating to me. I had read somewhere that I if they didn't close them down, it would immediately drive the price to somewhere around $100 an ounce in silver. >> So, they so they stopped it. And here's the interesting thing, Chris. What bothers me is is let's just play the game that they are manipulating and they're stepping in just from a thought process. Every time they smash it down, Asia and other countries, you know, you've got India that's buying, Asia's buying, supposedly Russia sees strategic material. out. We're giving the opportunity for them to buy it >> and ship it out of the country, not to come back at lower prices. That's why, you know, if this is a, you know, exercising strength, it's it's losing the long-term game really is what it's doing. Especially if if inflation's continuing and and silver is as strategic as what it looks like it is in the in the semiconductor, military, electrical area. I mean, we're just we're doing our citizens a disservice for what um pride in the interim period or exercise of power or maybe they're smashing it and having the opportunity to buy it themselves on the other side of those smash. But it doesn't make sense in any way for a professional money manager to just massively sell silver in a period of time like that. When the price is drifting higher, even if you want out, you're going to average out so that you don't impact the market. I mean, that's just that's just a fiduciary rule. If you're selling enough volume to where it's going to impact the price, you have a fiduciary responsibility to ease into the market. And I think that, you know, and that's one of the reasons why it's so hard for the retail investor. Big investors will will, you know, look 12 24 months out and sell 12 to 24 months ahead because they've got these massive amounts that would impact the price of the market. It just, you know, you don't see that in in really any other sector outside of smaller low volume stocks that can be manipulated. >> Yeah. That this this to be clear, this isn't this isn't price discovery. This is price setting. Somebody said, uh, we're going to pull the plug on this and just start selling me more. We're going to sell more paper contracts than the market can absorb, so it's going to drive the price lower. That's what they do. The SEC does nothing about it. The CFTC does nothing about it. I've long been of the opinion, Paul, that most of our commodities are similarly manipulated. Um, and this everything, corn, wheat, it just doesn't make sense. Supply, demand, oil, it's crazy. Everything that that you can just throw paper at, they've been setting the prices for so long. It's just what they know how to do. And they make money at it and they're rewarded and nobody punishes them for it. So, you get more of it, not less over time. And and that's the the situation we've been in for a long time until prediction. One of these days somebody finally wakes up and goes, "Wow, weirdest thing. Since we've been smashing the price of silver, it's been exiting the country and going to China, and we think we need it strategically for reasons." Um, they're going to put uh export controls on this stuff at some point, right? Instead of playing fairly and letting prices do what they do to balance markets, they'll say, "Wow, markets look unbalanced. Let's close the market down." It's going to annoy me to no end when it happens, but it's a prediction. It will happen. I I I believe that's a an accurate prediction. I do. And then the prices, you know, I would assume that's going to be, you know, very very good for upward prices, but they're they're going to test your patience for those that are invested and test your conviction in that thesis between now and that day though. >> Yeah. Well, well, this is interesting in in the silver story speaking of this whole market dynamic. Um so this I highlighted down here it says three days ago but this is now four days ago. Um ABC News Australia has this they put out this big you know two and a half minute piece on silver. So that's how it started and would you know it um two days later uh there was no more silver to be bought anywhere in Australia. It's gone. Shelves were stripped clean. Um yeah Tim Hacker putting everything everywhere all at once. Australian silver investors report empty shelves nationwide just two days after a program about how silver was broadcast on national television. So that didn't take much. Perth Mint totally out. Um that's interesting. >> Okay, so gold and silver, they're sending some kind of signals. We should pay attention. Um obviously we will I want to talk about equity markets now. I'm going to call them crazy. We've been talking about how crazy they are, but I'm really starting to feel like Paul, we're getting the markets are no longer signaling anything about the collective general health of the economy or the middle class. They're signaling something else. And I just came across this. I3 Invest put out this chart showing job openings compared to the S&P in purplish on top and and job openings in black below. This is a massive gap that's opened up between jobs in the S&P, which is just basically the S&P are generally the S&P 500, top 500 companies. The general health of people working is no longer connected to the price of those shares. That's a fundamental disconnect because ostensibly the shares are supposed to be about companies selling goods and services, products to people who don't have jobs. It's a weird thing like who are they selling all these things to if people aren't getting jobs? It's a um I thought that put it in pretty sharp relief right there. >> That really does. I mean, we've reached the point where there's a complete disconnect. Investors don't care about fundamentals. They'll make fun of you for paying attention to fundamentals. >> Yep. >> Uh because because they although nobody's saying it out loud, they convince themselves that it's completely different this time. >> It never is, of course, but but maybe we we'll see. Um also, we just had ADP come out with their September report. And of course, ADP is a private company. They do a private guess at where jobs are going to be, and they try their best to map what they think the BLS is going to say. But ADP is a payroll company, so they're just looking at hopefully just payroll data, which is fairly instantaneous stuff. It like either you're paying people a paycheck or you're not. And if they're processing at ADP, they probably have good insight into that. So they say at ADP that private employment fell 32,000 in September, far below the expected gain of 51,000 plus. August was revised down by 57,000 minus 57,000 to minus 3,000. So that rarely happens outside a recession. So we now have two months according to ADP of job losses, not gains. And so global markets investors observing, hey, a 50 basis point cut in October can't be ruled out. Maybe maybe that's what the markets are all excited about. Yay, people are losing their jobs. We get more free money um to work with. Uh maybe that's the story here. But >> yeah, it sure seems to be with the financialization of the economy and the market's been trained to try to frontr run every Fed action at this point. But you know, it it's interesting after that data came out, I saw a couple of things. I didn't see the revision, by the way, until you just showed that. That's actually makes it even more impactful. But here's one thing that I tell people. I I would pay more I pay more attention to the ADP report because of the fact that, you know, the 401ks typically don't allow you to roll over your funds while you're working unless you've got an inservice distribution. So if somebody's last day is on a Wednesday, you know, Friday they're they're shown on payroll and by Monday it's in the system and they can see. So, it's a more real-time data and that's why I like the ADP payroll report in spite of I just don't understand how they're saying it's completely unreliable because that's about as real time as you can get instead of all this seasonal mumbo jumbo to try to make the politicians look good. >> Well, ADP looks weak and then um we're looking at manufacturing. So, we had the September ISM u manufacturing survey came out. Kind of interesting spin on this. So, the overall PMI is contracting, although they say it's contracting slower. Uh, new orders contracting. Production was actually up. That went from 47.8 over the 50 mark to 51. So, production was up. That's interesting. Uh, but employment was contracting. Supplier delivery slowing. Inventory is contracting. Customer inventory is too low. Prices still increasing. No bueno. Backlog of orders contracting. That's not good. uh and export new orders, new export orders contracting, imports contracting. The impression is that overall the economy is growing. I don't know how you put all that together and get there, but but hey, that's what we that's where we're at. Manufacturing that that's not a good report. Um it's it's still weak and that comports of course with what we're seeing in in hiring. Um and then this was interesting. the University of Michigan consumer sentiment index is down to 55 according to Charlie Bleo's chart here. He says, quote, a reading below 99% of historical data points going back to 1952. And he says, but at the same time, US retail sales grew 4.8% over the last year, outpacing inflation by 1.8%. That would normally be a strong sign. My explanation for that is, well, maybe inflation isn't being measured properly, you know? I think that's a good explanation. >> Maybe. >> Yeah. Yeah. What was it? And Charlie pointed out the fact that supposedly health insurance has been deflationary here recently. Yeah. They're not reporting correctly. >> No. No. They're not. No. No. >> But notice at least his historically on that chart, we've been in a recession at these levels or imminent recession right around the corner. I mean, it's just absolutely amazing >> that that for whatever reason, you know, the narrative has changed to the point that, hey, it's a great economy and everything's absolutely wonderful just because asset prices are going up. >> Well, so that's explanation, but but maybe maybe it's not just inflation isn't being measured properly, but this is of course the the consumer sentiment index is they they pull all the households out there. Maybe they would get a different reading, Paul, if they just pulled the top.1% of households. Because now those 135,000 households, that's the top.1%, their net worth, of course, is uh vastly higher than the 67 million households that comprise the bottom 50%. So, I'm going to remind myself to get back to this point. Here's this, you know, that those 135,000 households, Paul, these are very well-connected people. They're very powerful. They mostly live in places like Washington DC and New York and stuff like that. They have huge political influence and if deflation comes, they stand to lose the most. So, they're not going to want deflation. Deflation, as you described it, loans can't be paid because I can't pay my loan, you can't pay your loan. And the domino effect and bank A fails, so bank B fails, and the whole thing sort of like goes till all the bad loans are rinsed out. And it's like a lot of destruction. The red line are the people who have the most to lose from a financial asset standpoint. So they're going to hate that. Like they're they will do everything they can to convince the government to stem check and print their way out of it. >> And if you look at how much it costs to win a political race now and the amount of money that goes in there, >> you know, those individuals are closest to the halls of power and constantly whispering in the ear of those politicians that are in control. They're not sitting down with with your average individual on a consistent basis and they're just not. So they're detached from the reality of what's taking place with the average American citizen. >> Yeah. And that detachment has been going for a while. We talked about this before, but it turns out that the top 10% of consumers or households are spending nearly half of all the expenditures that happen in the country. So that's why I think Paul you can get that this like when you poll everybody on average they're like dude things are really rough and it feels terrible and it's only felt this bad two other times since 1955 right so it feels pretty bad >> but these people they're not really noticing right now because you know they've got um you know their financial assets have been inflated these people aren't noticing because their financial assets have been inflated and by the way we talk about the stimmy checks and everything and oh you know people were paid a little bit more that to stay home than to work, you know, which is like 600 a week or something like that, I think. Uh was but look at who benefited from all that fed printing. These top.1% of households went from 12 trillion of wealth to nearly 24 trillion. They almost doubled their wealth over that period of time. And that's an extraordinary amount. They went up by 12 trillion while the bottom 50% are still banging around at 4 trillion total combined wealth. 67 million households with a combined total of $4 trillion. Just 135,000 households with uh six times that amount and accelerating. That's the system that the Fed is working extra hard to to keep going. >> That's right. And the sad part is is that tenth of a percent is going to say, "We're smarter than you. We make better decisions than you. we've made more sacrifices than you have. And that's not, you know, that's not the whole truth. The reality is you're at the right place at the right time connected to the centers of power and all of the government actions have benefited those individuals at the expense of the rest. And and I, you know, and I think that's the reason why you've talked about demoralization, suicide rates, divorce rates, you know, just just all the demoralization that's out there for the average individual. Um because we're in a situation where the powerful continue to get powerful, more powerful, and use those funds to to protect their empires and and you know, manipulate politicians through what I think are substantial amounts of bribes. I mean, you know, look, if you can trade on insider information as a politician and you're a company and you need something done and you go to somebody in your district and say, "Hey, next week we're getting ready to have a gangbuster report. go buy a bunch and I need this favor from you. Quite frankly, you know, we all know people that would jump on that opportunity in a heartbeat because they care more about the money that they're going to make off of that than the morality of what they're doing because there's very little fear of God out there right now. >> Well, we've all been well trained, right? I have every confidence the Fed will will print print print and do all of that. Um, but behind the scenes, it's just it's it's a little odd. And I do think that when we summit summarize this um it it looks rosy when you see the markets just sort of serenely drift or vault higher up into the right day after day, but on the back end you got gold sort of signaling maybe there's a little smoke in the theater. >> You know, you might want to pay attention to some of that. Um and as well these mysterious moves by the Trump administration, they may have some super genius plan I'm not aware of. I'm trying just to staple it together like what does this mean? What is when you reshape tariffs like this and you know you have uh you know the the the club of telling the world that they have to do exactly what we want when the world is discovering they have ways of dodging the club right and they can create their own currency the unit they're trading these warrants they're shifting into gold they're starting to do deals with each other outside of the umbrella of the US and Europe and all of that it it just it feels like there's the whole world is really changing and the people who I see right Now uh and again this is one man's opinion but when I look at countries that are doing what they need to do in order to secure their future China is leaps and bounds ahead of the west at this point in time from the standpoint of energy policy manufacturing dominance um really dialing in manufacturing processes having entire supply chains kind of contained within that ability. So they have the capability of of very much um providing for themselves with one exception which is energy. But now that they're building a a Trans Siberian pipeline to bring natural gas down that formerly was going to go to Europe but now it's going to go to China and other pipelines to bring Russian oil down into China. I I see that getting solved as well. So, so I'm I'm not clear what these investments are that that we're putting in here, how those are going to >> It doesn't feel coherent yet, right? >> Coherent plan would be, >> oh, we don't need as many people trained by our schools for those things we used to have them for because those jobs are going away. So, we're going to need more people with these kinds of skills. So, let's really put some resources there because this is a multigenerational issue. And oh, we're going to have some supply chain issues because turns out we buy a lot of really important things from somebody. we might go to war with at some point. So, let's get that stuff back home right away. Um, and and I think we would be doing things like that. I I don't see that level of coordination yet, but maybe it's coming. I >> I don't see it either. So Chris, if you're wanting to bring manufacturing back and and argue with me all you want because I I want to ask your opinion about this, but okay, let's implement the tariffs, equalize the playing field. So now you can compete with lower cost of labor countries or the manufacturing powerhouse. Like out of China, one thing that they have as advantage is they're just ability to manufacture and it takes time to build that. And Luke pointed out just the dramatic rise in the use of robotics which makes them cheaper to produce. So, if you're going to use the terrorists to reg uh to equalize the playing field, wouldn't you immediately drop regulations on the other side of it so that so that it's easier to build manufacturing? Have you heard of a major drop of regulation? >> And and I can tell you this from being in business in 2004, it was easy for me to to to leave corporate and go independent. regulations have risen to the point now that it is much harder for somebody at the place that I was then to leave and go independent because your cost of business has risen. What that is is not necessarily protecting anybody except for the major firms because it raises the barrier to entry. And my problem is is a lot of these regulations, if you really sit there and look at them and you look at the evidence of of what's taking place before and after, it's raising the barrier to entry to build moes around these major corporations. It's not to protect the environment like they they pitch us the the deal with. Yes, there are things that protect the environment, but they're a minor part that's marketed major so that so that it can raise the barrier to entry to protect the moes around these big corporations. And quite frankly, I don't blame them for trying to do it. But there's supposed to be a check and balance to where your politicians and your regulators instead of setting themselves up or their kids up when they come out of office to go work for these major corporations, it's their responsibility to stand there and say, "No, we're going to protect freedom and we're going to put reasonable regulations in place, not just the ones that protect your business." >> So, so this is uh this is not US-based. This is in the UK. But I just want to show you when you say the politicians are supposed to like somehow have like the their finger on the pulse or or be operating in the best interests of their country. Um my counterpoint would be this interview with a UK politician who um let me just pull this up real quick. I got to take this. Let me get this sound up. Let me see if I got the sound right. >> No, because you've got to have a transition. But we will ensure that we're not selling petrol and diesel vehicles from 20 new petrol and diesel vehicles from 2030. We want people to be able to carry on getting them secondhand and so on. But we've also got to make it affordable for people. >> Exactly. >> You know, I wouldn't have been able to say this to you 15 years ago because frankly solar, wind, they were more expensive than fossil fuels. But now when they're cheaper, why would you stick with expensive insecure fossil fuels when you can have cheaper, cleaner renewables? >> So, >> okay, buddy. Um uh so so uh okay there's so much wrong here. Where do I start? Um every country there well I showed this chart in the past where if you regress a line that you put countries and what percent of their uh of their energy is coming from electricity is coming from solar and wind and you look at the cost of that it's a straight line. The more solar and wind you have the more expensive it is. So there he keeps say he just repeats these things as politician. Well because because we know what the solar and wind is cheaper than fossil fuels. Why would you have insecure unstable fossil fuels when you could have this really right Spain just what got plunged into complete darkness because of grid instability due to its solar right an entire nation spent 36 hours in darkness and this guy's like what? Yeah, we'd want that obviously, but they're actively moving ahead to prevent the sale of any new petrol cars in the UK. And guess what? They don't have the electricity production to support that doesn't matter. So, we like our predictions. They do this by 2035, you're going to be hearing this, right? So, um due to the uh unavailability of electricity, our our um our permissive usage scheme means that you will only have 15 minutes per day to um utilize your vehicle. There's your 15-minute city, right? I guarantee you it's coming. It's It's just like in the UK, they said, "Oh, we're going to let all these immigrants in, illegal migrants actually, and we're going to let them all in. And now that they're here, we're going to have to implement a digital ID because we have all these to combat illegal immigrants. Like, so the government creates the problem so they can have the solution. And the solution is always less freedom and less control for you as the citizen. And the UK is just ahead of us by a few years, which is why I keep pointing them out. >> Yeah. And I mean, and the reality is it's intellectual arrogance is what it is. I know better than you and I'm going to make decisions for you. And it's not recognizing that we're a body of people and everybody has some type of insight and something to offer. And that's why totalitarians are so such a horrible thing. Let let us have the freedom and let the free market make the decision and the innovation that's there. They're not the god that they think they are to control things. But the problem is they're in control and they're keeping the average uh citizen distracted with these shiny little objects and propaganda that drives their narrative for their own benefit. And we're going to wake up at some point in the future and we're going to have change around us to where where we're all going to suffer because of the foolishness that they're heading us down in that direction. >> Agreed. Agreed. So, listen, I I happen to think that freedom begets prosperity. um not totalitarian control just it's never worked out historically. So I really hope that that we don't we don't have to go down that foolish path here in this country. I I really hope that we understand that a broad stable middle class is actually the path to prosperity. It's the path to to peace. It's the path to people having lives of meaning and fulfillment and purpose. Um shoveling more and more money to fewer and fewer people. It it's a terrible idea. The Fed should never have been allowed to do that. Every chart on the wealth gap shows you that they are clearly favoring the very very few at the expense of the many. I don't know who gave them that role. You know, I call it reverse Robin Hood. Steal from the many to give to the few. Um, and that's who they are and and we should recognize that, but they shouldn't be given free reign to continue to do that because that's social engineering and it's obviously history says not a good idea. Um, but we're seeing more and more young people wake up to this idea and more and more young people are expressing their displeasure with this stuff. They may do it improperly from time to time. We may see a socialist mayor in in uh New York City as a consequence of that. Uh, I I think that's not a good response. But if the if the kids have no other if there's no if nobody else even remotely is saying, "I understand your problems and here's how I'm going to address them." Mdami at least is saying that I could disagree completely and I do with how he thinks he's going to fix that by taking from these and giving to those. It's uh it sounds good on paper but it's not actually um the issue. The issue is that we have a systemic system of money creation that's now out of control and it's funneling it in increasing quantities and rates to an ever smaller number of people. And wouldn't you know, those people are starting to go, you know what would be awesome? A total system of control where I could make sure that all the people under me don't ever get their footing and, you know, I don't know, >> contest the system that's given me so much. That's how it's kind of shaping up. It it it bodess badly for prosperity, um, as far as I can tell. >> And all they need to do, you know, to to solve the problem is just stop printing money. Y, you know, balance the budget, stop the bailouts, and let it and let it come apart. And those who are prepared and prudent will step up and take the uh positions of power, and those that are foolish and overleveraged are going to lose what they've got. And then we're going to have a foundation that's sustainable going forward instead of socialism is not the answer. You know, the real problem is, unfortunately, most people just don't realize it's the constant bailouts, the rewarding of of overleveraging and driving people because they feel like they have to with the cost of living going up to become speculators instead of investors. And if if we were back to a system where you could become an an investor, then people are going to invest into things that are going to make our lives better instead of speculating that, you know, this one company is going to be the answer and control everything from this point forward. >> Well said. And um I see we're at the end of our aotted time here, Paul. So, I just want to say to everybody, listen, if you want to talk to Paul andor his amazing team, please go to peakfinancialinvesting.com. Fill out a simple form and we'll get the process started within 48 business hours. Somebody will contact you and set up uh your initial appointment. And again, it's about planning. It's about coming up with a plan. It's and it's a plan that's going to be tailored and designed for you given all of your circumstances to really go through this correctly. Paul, you're going to ask for a lot of information from people before the meeting, right? so that you can >> really look at think through thoughtfully consider their unique position and take it from there. So that's the process and um uh I really advise everybody should go through it now while you can. >> And I will say you know I I I get the data before the planning meeting because I typically spend an hour to an hour and 15 minutes stress testing your situation if the data is accurate. And the one thing I want to explain to people, yes, US market valuations are ridiculous. The places that people are chasing right now are ridiculously dangerous in all context of history. But that doesn't mean that there's not opportunity. I'm seeing some of the greatest opportunity that I've seen in my entire career in specific areas that are just waiting on capital to start coming in their direction. So everything is not dangerous. It's just that we're in a period of time to where you've got I believe that you need to be adaptive and you have to have some type of decision-making process that can help you adapt to to the unknown future that we're coming because things are going to change. the the current status quo is going to break at some point. Those investors that have a strategy that can help them adapt tactically and from a riskmanagement standpoint or I can't make any guarantees. I don't want to make it too strong, but are more than likely because of the prudence and the wisdom associated with it navigate the days ahead far better than they otherwise would. >> Excellent. Well, thank you for doing that. It's a valuable service and I know people really appreciate it. uh whether they end up working with you or not, everybody has told me, "Wow, that was so worth it." Um so yeah, it's a it's a great it's a great great service. >> It's my honor. I I love doing it quite frankly. I love helping people. >> Excellent. Well, with that, this has been Finance You. I hope you enjoyed it. We'll see you next week when we come back with our usual edition with Paul. And um until then, keep your eye on gold and watch the markets very carefully. I'm Chris Martinson signing off. [Music]