Iran War Market Shock: Energy Prices, Shipping Risk And Supply Chain Fallout
Summary
Energy Security: The conversation centers on Middle East conflict risks, oil price suppression claims, and potential for a severe energy shock cascading through global markets.
LNG Disruption: With ~20% of global LNG offline, Europe and Asia may face triage decisions, driving cost-push inflation and stressing energy infrastructure.
Supply Chain Risk: Attacks on tankers and container ships, Maersk suspensions, and China’s COSCO halting Panama port services highlight fragile logistics and just-in-time vulnerabilities.
Semiconductor Dependencies: Helium byproduct disruptions and potential scarcity of critical inputs (e.g., gallium) imperil chip manufacturing in Taiwan and South Korea.
Market Manipulation: Allegations of oil and silver price suppression raise concerns about trust in capital markets and the long-term damage from distorted price signals.
Financial Stress: Private credit red flags (e.g., fund markdowns) and rising hardship 401(k) withdrawals suggest underlying consumer and credit strain.
Active Management: Guests advocate tactical, risk-managed portfolios over passive strategies amid heightened geopolitical risk, inflation pressures, and overvalued equities.
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. For US investors that are just blindly following this modern portfolio theory, this is probably the greatest risk that I have seen and study in history and anything that I've walked through in the past 28 years. Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of Finance Hugh. I'm your host Chris Martinson back with Paul Ker of Kiker Wealth Management. And of course, we're going to have a lot to talk about because there is this little thing called a war going on in the Gulf region over there in Middle East. Paul, good to see you, buddy. >> Good to see you as well, Chris. >> Well, you're looking tanner than I am. We don't we haven't gotten to spring yet. So, >> well, I did get to spend a little uh uh long weekend and I actually got in the sun. I think it was several months there at the worst part of winter. I come in before daylight and I leave after uh after dark or after daylight's down so I don't see the sun for a couple of weeks. Feel more like a vampire. >> Well, I think everybody, we all need to do what we can do to try and stay calm and um kind of let this stuff wash over us. But I will tell you, Paul, that I'm as as alarmed as I've ever been in my life. And some people might say, "Well, of course, you're always seeing the risks." But I do believe in watching the risks as they unfold. It served me very well during the great financial crisis. I was ahead of the pack there. Served me well during COVID. I was ahead of the pack there. And it's going to serve me well here again, Paul. I have the same vibe, only this feels larger than either of those two events to me at this point in time. And I could try and make that case, but it's sort of a little qualitative. Like I I'm just the pace of the events. Every morning, Paul, I wake up and it's something new that's so dramatic that really should have like this enormous impact on markets yet there's no market action happening. That's the same experience I had as I was watching subprime bonds blow up in '08. As I watched COVID raising across the world and the market just for whatever reason was just calm and placid there in February of 2020. I think that's where we are again here. What are you thinking? >> No, I'm with you as well, Chris. And and look, thank you for your position of being a watchman. Uh it's a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing for those people that listen to you, but the stress that comes along with being a watchman is something that you have to actively fight off. >> But, you know, as you're talking about that, I'm thinking I think people should go back and watch The Big Short at this point if they've not seen it in quite some time. >> Yep. because because there is a period of time where the big players are are positioning behind the scenes to protect themselves and it obuscates what's taking place in the market and I too with you I am far more concerned right now than what I was in in 2008 because look equity markets took a huge hit but they were not as expensive as they are right now how it was isolated to housing but now we've got housing we've got the markets that are overpriced you've got private equity that's starting to blow up and that's just absolute hidden, you know, in the shadows, ticking time bomb. That's that's, you know, we've been talking about that for quite some time. So, we're literally in the everything bubble with the exception of commodities u and and some international investments. So, for us investors that are just blindly following this modern portfolio theory, this is probably the greatest risk that I have seen and study in history and anything that I've walked through in the past 28 years. Well, as we know, Paul, when when when markets are unnaturally calm, sort of the calm before the storm, right? So, let's talk about today, uh, it's the 11th of March at the at the time of this recording. So, I wake up this morning and I see this, right? Turns out Iranian drones reportedly struck oil storage tanks at the port of Salala in Oman. And yes, multiple tanks are are on fire here. And this has been sourced from multiple sources. So, this is real. It happened. Was it Iranian drones? Probably. But what I can tell you for sure is it's on fire. And it's it's really important here, Paul, because Oman has been left out of this more or less up to this point in time. Iran is has a they're sort of in a neutral relationship with Oman. So, they're keeping hands off. Now, it's hands-on. So, you know what happens? Like, if this had happened two years ago, Paul, oil goes limit up. It goes up, I don't know, 10 $15 right on the news because of what's implied here. But when we look over here at um let's see if we can find this. Yeah, we'll go here. Oil on the on that news poll. Nothing. It's the exact same. The the news came out right around here about 11. It's it's up a it's up a dollar maybe, but it's in this range. It's been stuck here for days now. Somewhere between 80 and 90. It's just bouncing around in there. can't can't seem to crack out above that 90 mark which is right there. So, somebody's holding it down. And I guess okay, that's a lot of power in that. But the problem is that when you manipulate markets like this, two things. You don't end up with supplies coming out of the ground, it doesn't send the right signals to people. I worry that people are looking at these prices, Paul, and interpreting that as reality and saying, "Oh, it can't be that bad because the price of oil isn't $200 a barrel, so it must be okay." It's clearly not okay in the trajectory of the war over there. And then the second thing that happens is eventually people find out that those are fake prices and that there's no delivery on the back end of those contracts and then you wreck your markets. So they are literally risking destroying US capital markets as a useful thing, a vehicle because how can you trust something that you know sets a fake price and then won't deliver when you demand delivery? I think that's what's coming. I I understand why they do it for optics, political reasons, narrative control, all that. But when you treat markets badly, Paul, I I think you end up breaking them. So I'm I'm worried that the United States is going to suddenly lose its premier sort of position as the world's financial center, >> right? >> Um and for good reason. >> Well, it's dishonest scales. What the market is supposed to be is a forward pricing mechanism. So it's supposed to be all knowing where all the players in their different positions are p taking their positioning and and it's supposed to be anticipating six months ahead what takes place. That's what we have been taught in in the education of the markets. That was the reality for a period of time. But but we also have some warnings and some types and shadows or birth pains. You take silver for a while. The question was, was it manipulated for a long period of time and then all of a sudden this price just breaks free and skyrockets higher? Well, that's the same thing that we run the risk with an oil. And it doesn't give the market time to to reposition and shield itself or investors to shield themselves ahead of time if you have this hidden hand for political propaganda purposes that is actually keeping its hand on that ball and holding it down, which makes it a whole lot worse on the citizenry of our country when they do lose control. And they will if if Iran has the capability to continue, like they said, they're not backing down. If they have the capa capability to continue to keep hitting these major points, you know, the port, right? I mean, that's where you bring it to to store it to get it shipped out. So, I mean, this this is a unbelievably risky environment right here. and the markets whistling Dixie through the graveyard absolutely complacent because of certain levers that they're able to put put apparently a hidden hand on. >> Well, it it's oil is there there's three big things we have to worry about in in the Gulf region, right? Oil is the one catches all the attention, but crude oil came out of there. Also, refined products came out. So, it was about 15 million barrels of crude, unrefined. And then the refined products which could be gasoline, diesel, NAPA, stuff that comes out of the refinery. Second would be uh natural gas, LNG. Now LNG, there really aren't strategic reserves of gas kicking around. Some countries do have gas stockpiles. So we do in the United States, we have these underground injection caverns. Europe has some of those same things, but a lot of Asia doesn't have that capability. So it was more of a hand-to-mouth just in time. You know, it has to keep flowing. And and that stopped. LG has completely stopped coming out now for what are we 9 days into this right at this point. Um and and already we're seeing huge problems with that and a lot of scrambling because there wasn't that much extra capacity. That's 20% of the world's LNG is gone and it's gone for 9 days now. If that goes on for just a few more days, you're going to have to see you're going to see countries starting to do triage. Meaning Germany they I know what their triage plan is. If they get below a certain critical level in their gas supplies, they shut off heavy industry first because they're heavy users and they kind of peel it back until finally the last thing they're defending is residential because they don't want people getting cold in their homes, right? So, so but they're going to have to make that same sort of triaging in all sorts of Asian countries like Japan and um uh Taiwan, Korea, etc. So, they're they're actually scrambling pretty hard right now. And then there are all these derivative products that we didn't know anything about till oh how much sulfur and sulfuric acid comes out of that region? Oh, critical amounts. It goes into all sorts of products. Oh, helium. Yep. Turns out helium is a byproduct of the LNG process. We freeze the gas down. That's how you get it to turn a gas into a liquid. You make it super cold. And that's minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit. And this gas that's left on top, which didn't freeze yet, is helium. So they skim that off. That goes to South Korea. They do what's called a 69's manufacturing process on it and get it to a 99.9999% purity. And then that goes into Taiwan's chipm and also South Korea's chipm processes. That is now stopped. So they're scrambling to try and figure out how they can do that. Point here is that we're seeing all sorts of derivative things, second order, third order effects. Hard to get our hands around it. But the idea that the stock market would say, you know, it's not really that big a deal. Um, here we can see, you know, hasn't this is the S&P sort of rounded off a little bit here, but since this thing started in March, that that's the total activity right there. Not even as bad as the tariff tantrum back here. Um, you know, in uh what was that? Um, February through April of last year. This is this is this is that why this just doesn't make any sense to me. Like >> no, >> somebody's not discounting anything. >> They're not the story. >> Well, and and and to be fair, I completely understand why investors are complacent right now. One, they're fully bought into passive. And if you're fully bought into passive, the large majority are the largest majority, then it doesn't matter if there's nukes in the air and you know that they're going to land an exchange, the rules of that strategy are you're passive. You do nothing. The second thing in addition to that is every time the market has started to roll over, you know, especially in the tariff situation, Trump goes from short-term pain, we're going to have to take this short-term pain to, oh, change my mind. Let's turn things around, right? or the Fed's been able to come in and bail out in the past. So, like Pavlov's dog, the large majority of investors have have been taught to freeze when they see environments like this because they're more concerned about missing upside opportunity than they are looking foolish because they sell and then Trump comes out and tells you you're a fool because you sold or or you know or or your neighbor tells you you're a fool because didn't you know the Fed was going to bail us out? So investors have been trained unfortunately to to do nothing in environments like this and and you know hey there are periods of time where it makes sense to do nothing right but this is not a period of time where you want to be um you don't want to let fear and emotion take over completely. You need to make logical decisions but you have to make a decision. Hey, what's worse if if this continues and and things come apart and the market goes a catastrophic event and we're down 30 40 50% and it ripples across the economy, you know, uh uh is that going to impact you in a lot more damaging way than having your feelings hurt if this does settle down? We're concerned over nothing. Let's say the hidden hand stops and Iran agrees to stop. Trump agrees to stop and we go back to holding hands in the world at that point and you miss 5% upside potential. Even if it's over right now, there's damage that's still going to continue to work through the economy and private credit is still an issue that's going to work its way through and we're really going to find the reality of that over the next 12 months. You know, that's that's the problem. But people aren't thinking critically at this point in general as you know, I'm just talking in general. Well, I I agree totally and I understand the complacency because of course the Fed always steps in and prints whenever they have to. So the idea is well they they're going to have to print here. The problem is is that the Fed I think has so one of the things the Fed can't do is aggressively print while inflation is raging. >> Right >> now you and I have talked about that so-called double hump inflation, right? The you know the 70s and 80s are going to be repeated by the 20s and the mid20s, right? Uh, and so if that comes true, well, what would make that come true? Well, obviously an energy supply shock that translates into energy price shocks that feeds into everything, right? We're already seeing really, really outsized increases in costs for things like fertilizer and feed stocks and plastics and on and on, right? So, that's all going to that shock is already in the python as they say, right? That that that's going to bleed through. And if it carries on for much longer and oil does go to 200 or 300 or 400 a barrel, the Fed, I think, is going to be handcuffed. I don't think they're going to be able to print like everybody expects them to because that's going to be they could risk something even worse than an economic downturn. They could be risking the very dollar itself at that point. And it's going to crush the markets at the same point too because that I mean what good's it going to do if you've got that cost push inflation that's coming through and the supply chain disruption that's taking place with these ports that are being struck in the Middle East. But I mean you take CO all the money that's printed then but people still trying to operate and function in society. It's going to have far worse inflationary effects if they just start printing money like crazy and then capital fleeing out of the United States. It's a very precarious situation right now. >> Well, we've already saw it like so it it finally got revealed, I think, to the world that the silver market was heavily manipulated, right? And it had been for a long time and people sort of wrapped their heads around that. And what we saw was the volume of trading on the comics and silver has just been shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. They they relaxed the margin requirements to try and get some of these people back. But Paul, once you wreck a market, once people decide this roulette table has a magnet under the wheel and I'm not playing anymore, >> they don't come back very easily. And that's what I keep talking about is this. I have a hard time putting into words, but one should not lightly destroy one's capital markets for little short-term political gain. Let's rig it for a little while. I have to make a couple bucks this quarter, but you know, that's killing the goose that laid the golden egg. like this is our capital markets are one of our most important assets to the prosperity of this country and if those suddenly fall apart for really dumb reasons I think there ought to be massive penalties for people who engage in such behavior. >> No, absolutely. I mean that life sentences with that, you know, because of the consequences and all the people that it's going to affect around the globe because of those lies. And really, Chris, it comes down to the point, you know, I think we've talked about before, um, I don't know who to attribute the quote to, but the reality is you can sp you can spend a lifetime building a reputation by operating in good character, right? or if you're just building a reputation at some point that your your lack of character underneath is going to cause you to destroy that lifetime of a reputation and then you may not have a whole lifetime to rebuild that. So, we've had all of this period of time where the US used to, hey, our markets were liquid, our markets were honest, our markets were held to a good standard. That's what we built upon in the past. But now you've got weak men who don't allow these honest markets to take place, which is distorting a signal for people that are still trusting these markets to make financial decisions for themselves, their families, their states, their nations, their communities. And that's my concern. I mean, you know, we have to play the game by the rules that are forced upon us. But the reality is we have to be wise to where it is too and protect ourselves by by by walking a different path. And there's very few people walking a different path by running riskmanaged, tactical, adapted portfolios and then sometimes just saying, "Hey, I'm going to set my pride down. I may be wrong. I may miss a little bit of opportunity right here uh over the next three or four months, but there's a big difference between missed opportunity and lost capital. Missed opportunity is a lot easier to make up for. Lost capital is a lot harder because a 50% decline in the market means you have the arithmetic of a loss. You have to make a 100% to get back to even. So let's say you got a million dollars in your portfolio. You lose 50%. Now you've got 500,000. 50% return gets you back to 750. You have to have a 100% return to get back to even. So, I mean, that's a decade. That's one of the reasons why you look back historically, it's highly likely that we have a decade of zero returns in the S&P 500 if if there's any lessons to be learned from history just from the mathematics of how this euphoria and this complacency has caused the market to be overpriced. You add other events on top of this. You know, if we go back to that lower end of that range, that's a 70% decline. That's not outside the realm of possibility when a system that is completely financialized and absolutely running on just in time inventory for maximum profitability. One thing breaks, it can ripple across the whole system and take decades to recover. >> Well said. And Paul, when we come back, I think we're going to take a look at this. I I think we have um I think Trump just admitted that they've been monkeying with the markets and so we'll hear about that as soon as we come back. Today's markets are more volatile than ever with ongoing economic and geopolitical uncertainty. Navigating such environments requires thoughtful adaptive strategies, not a one-sizefits-all approach. At Peak Financial Investing, our registered investment advisory firm connects clients with experienced wealth managers who focus on active portfolio management. These professionals use evidence-based strategies designed to respond to changing conditions, not outdated formulas, but customized approaches grounded in research, discipline, and risk awareness. We believe in open, informed conversations, including discussing tools like precious metals and diversification as part of a broader financial strategy. Every investor's situation is unique, and our advisers tailor their guidance accordingly. Visit peakfinancialinvesting.com today to schedule your free consultation and explore how proactive management can support your financial goals. I'm Dr. I'm Chris Martinson. Proud to work with Peak Financial Investing and my support reflects my professional views. I encourage you to take control of your financial future by making informed decisions. All right, welcome back everybody. Um, explosive sort of an allegation there. Let's listen very carefully to what what Trump says here. He just said this this morning. I apologize for the music. I did not put the music on here. Um, this music is uh put on by the White House itself. In recent years, the regime and its terror proxies have launched attacks on hundreds of commercial vessels. We're putting an end to all of this threat once and for all, and the result will be lower oil prices, oil and gas prices for American families. We've done that. We've done it. We've brought it very low. This was >> We've done that. We've brought it very low. So, I don't know what he's talking about because oil is basically up close to 50% um from where it was before somebody made the decision of choice to attack Iran. Um what do you think he what do you think he meant there when he said we we've done that. We've brought it very low because we saw oil hit $119 a barrel and it got just crushed by somebody selling a whole lot of oil in the markets uh over the next hour and a half. One thing that I did notice, it looks like he's reading from his script, but when he, you know, when he looks up, he's going off script and saying, "Hey, just to reiterate the point, we've done that. We brought it very low." >> I don't I don't know what that means, but but I it doesn't look like that was necessarily on his script. Maybe it was, right? >> Interesting. >> But it's a thought. Um, >> you know, maybe being completely honest. Yeah. I'll see >> once and for all and the result will be lower oil prices, oil and gas prices for American families. We've done that. We've done it. We brought it very low. This was just an excursion into something that had to be done. >> Also, the minimization there of the excursion of something that just had to be done. Um I don't think he's made the case yet from certainly hasn't to me as to what the imminence was that required all of this to happen. Um, and and that's the a concerning part to me here, Paul, is that >> we're getting very close to finish. >> He says we're getting very close to finishing that here. Like, wait, what's the strategy? Like, I don't know where we're going or what what success would look like or what the strategy is or nobody seems to know, right? Um, and so that's a concern here. And markets aren't supposed to like that sort of indecision that that that they don't like that uncertainty, right? I'm just not our markets are about as certain as they could be. this is all going to finish soon and we're getting right back to our regularly scheduled programming, you know, and I'm just I'm not seeing it at this point. We can cover some of the more data, but I I have not every single day, you know, as my friend Michael Yan says, he says, "Wars only do two things. They grow and then they grow out of control." Right. So, it still feels like we're in the grow stage and maybe close to the out of control stage, but that's just what I see out here in the cheap seeds. >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean you you hear the reports that hey, we're this thing's nearly over. What there was a headline the Trump administration came out today and said there's really not much to hit. We're close to the end of this. That's not exactly what he said, but that's the gist of what was said. But you know the thing that bothers me about their lack of abil his lack of ability their lack of ability to explain exactly why and I've seen this when I do plans and I talk with people in the retirement planning process uh is we show people why they have to do something you know we show people why you have to make this sacrifice right look if you want to if you want to retire at 65 you're going to have to make this sacrifice now you're going to have to save x amount of dollars you're going to have to be disciplined or hey, if you want to work till 80, continue to do what you're doing. So, you know, I I didn't I wasn't able to phrase it the way Jordan Peterson said one time. He said, if you can explain to someone the why that they need to do something, they can handle all of the discipline and pain that comes through and getting there. And that's my biggest concern about the communication that's coming out. I haven't heard an exact reason of why exactly why. right at this point. If they had nukes, I would have thought they have used them already. Maybe they're holding them for later if they have them. But, um, you know, that bothers me. Why are we in the midst of this? Why? Especially with the precariousness of our markets already and how overpriced they are, the economic consequences can be severe, you know, which leads me to believe and theorize, well, maybe they understand these markets are kind of reaching the end and this is an excuse to point the finger at somebody else and blame it on them or at least try to. I mentioned there are variety of things that you you know the LNG the this that um but also the whole region is served by container ships both bringing food in and other things out. Um and so we have here uh a container ship hit by an unknown projectile. You see it's smashed into this one a midship here caused a lot of damage. Um and then we also have uh here a US flagged oil tanker um yesterday and a Portuguese flagged container ship the so long uh all kind of on fire here. Again, Paul, these should have been like absolute like like market moving things. And if we come here, this one also the Mayori Nari Bangkok flag tanker. And this one, by the way, Paul, has a big old hole in the side right here that looks more like one thing we haven't seen Iran use yet, but I'm wondering if they busted them out, is anti-hship missiles. Uh, the whole idea that, you know, there was this um really bizarre event yesterday, which I'm sure you saw. The energy secretary, Chris Wright, tweets out that a US naval vessel had escorted a tanker through the Gulf. oil prices got slammed 19% in on the back of that tweet and then they had to that was a fake tweet. They said, "Oh, it was an intern put that out. Market moving event." Didn't say they fired the intern. Didn't explain if anybody in the administration managed to put oil shorts on and closed them over that. That was a market moving tweet and it was wrong. Fantastically wrong. Right. Um and Iran immediately came out and put out a tweet that trolled us, you know. So this whole thing's kind of being uh uh running kind of fun but in a funny way. But we have imagine the lack of controls you have when you accidentally send out not just a market moving tweet but one that is so fantastically geopolitically laden. This idea that a naval a naval boat had escorted a US naval asset had escorted a ship. It speaks to a really profound either lack of control or they're just doing stuff that um is worse than I can even imagine, which is monkeying with the markets to make a few bucks for them and their families. I don't know. But if I sent that tweet out, buddy, I'd have SEC lawyers knocking on my door. Oh my goodness. You think about the restrictions that we have sometimes, at least from my side, being licensed on what you can say and what you can't say. I mean, yeah, you're exactly right. because it doesn't fit their narrative unfortunately. >> Right? >> And a lot of people would have lost money o over that fake tweet and a lot of people would have made a lot of money if you were short right before that tweet. All right. So some other things that are going on that we have to talk about from a market standpoint. So Shell just declared force majour on his liqufied natural gas contracts with some of its customers in Asia. Force majour act of god means that it it's a contract clause that that sits in there which basically says hey look whatever we promised you it's just we can rip that up now it rips it up for both parties so it it's companies are usually pretty loathed to declare force majour you really only do it when you really have to because the next thing your former customers do is they go find a new supplier and then you're going to have to woo them back from that at some point in the future if you can. So this isn't something that companies just sort of like throw out to save a couple bucks, you know, because they can't deliver. It's a pretty big deal. So I've been seeing force majour is like now something that's every single day there's new companies declaring force majour is the supply chains ripple out and get hit starting with LG, starting with petroleum products, rippling all the way through, but also we're seeing it in um URA. Let's see where's that one? Um yeah, so fertilizer URA prices are starting to spike pretty good here. And so we could get a fertilizer crisis. Wor worst possible time cuz it's March. This is normally when you buy fertilizer and begin applying it to fields in the northern hemisphere. Um so there's going to be a lot of a lot of pain around that. I've already seen US farmers starting to demand relief from all this somehow because they're just getting whipsawed like crazy on this. And so we'll see what happens with that. But this is just starting this sort of ripple effect and it goes through uh here. This was a great chart somebody pointed out. So oil and gas comes out uh and you turn it into feed stocks. Butane, Napa, condensates, natural gas, propane, ethane. These are feed stocks that then go into big refinery. I mean big petrochemical plants and get turned into basic chemicals. You get ammonia which can be used as a fertilizer, butine, ethylene which are used in plastics, propyline, plastics, um all this stuff and then it goes into the chemical intermediates, right? Which then get turned into things, final products like industrial chemicals and paints and synthetic rubbers and explosives and resins and foams and dyes and all sorts of things, soaps and detergents. So, so this whole this is what actually just got force masured all across Asia because they ran out of this stuff at this level of of the overall um supply chain process. So everything downstream sort of gets hit from that as we mentioned before. It just means of the of the stocks that are out there, they get cost push inflation gets very expensive. And this of course creates a lot of trouble for the Federal Reserve and its ability to even contemplate relfying everything which is pumping money into the markets. But they might anyway, but won't be good for average families. >> No, it's not going to be good for average families. And that means that, you know, I was talking with several people uh over the weekend and they're like, you know, we had a little bit of a reprieve in food prices, but you know, food prices have reacelerated again. And this just means that there's potential reaceleration again or further acceleration of food prices later in the year as that cost push inflation works its way through the system. And and that's a big deal right here at planting season. It is. And companies are going to have one of two choices. If you're a farmer that's barely making ends meet and and the difference between, you know, paying is bankruptcy, then maybe you don't put as much fertilizer out, which means you don't get as much of a yield, which means less goods. If the Fed prints on top of that, that's more money chasing less goods, which means even worse inflation potentially. So, I mean, it seems that the Fed is trapped in a corner at this point because we don't have the deflationary aspects of the 2008 crisis still in the system now where they could print that money and get away with it. So, now when they print that money, there's near instant, you know, uh, what they call, they want to call reliquation or inflationary pressures is the way I want to put it, working its way into the system. On one end, we can talk about how, okay, you know, container ships are getting hit and so there, you know, they're going to pull back. Marisk is the largest shipping company in the world. They have the most ships. And they put out a memo yesterday, I think, that said to all their former Gulf clients, and I say former because they said they're going to immediately and completely suspend all pickups, drop offs, they're not doing any shipping till March 26. and then they'll reconsider assuming you if the war is still going on but after seeing the container ships it just got struck with missiles we just talked about. So Maris is saying no okay no more shipping to this region now this is this gets hard because the region needs stuff coming and going all the time food coming in principally and and their products leaving. So this is a very very big deal and the logistics behind that even if you said like you say okay peace breaks out tonight it's all rainbows and unicorns tomorrow it will be months two two months before the logistics is sort of unsnarled and it'll take month at least a month to get LG back up uh fully going and we don't know how long it's going to take to get uh oil back running because they had to shut down a bunch of fields and it's a very complicated process to start them up without dam damaging them and um your long-term u you know irr you get out of that. So this is a mess oi and by the way I just I I got to reiterate this. This was a war of choice. This was a decision some people made. They've tried to sell it to us as it was imminent you know and and I saw Tom Cotton on on um the senator and he said well it's you know we we've been facing an imminent threat for 47 years from Iran. Like dude, nothing can be imminent for 47 years. >> Right. >> It's just not how words work, you know? >> Right. Right. >> So, >> I I even my point here is even if this stops right now, Paul, the the ripple effects are going to be lasting months. >> And it makes and and look, when a market's priced to perfection, you have to have a perfect outcome to continue the path that we're on. and we're not getting a perfect outcome right now. And that makes it even more challenging to keep things going um as the way investors are expecting right now. I mean, we're at a point where a 2% decline on the S&P people act like it's a a 2008 decline. I can only imagine how they're going to act, you know, if if if these plates start dropping as this works its way through the system. So the big concern I've had is is that you know what if the rest of the world like China and Russia principally but India too a lot of Asia say look United States and and Israel this was this was kind of a war of choice but we're going to have to bear the consequences of this right and so to the extent that that that we're just sort of like saying oh well it was all about us we we wanted to do this so we did it everybody else has to eat the consequences my concern Paul has always been that what if those other countries Oh, well, we don't want to trade with you anymore. You know, you've just made it too difficult to do business with you. What would what would happen? And I think we saw um the first hint of that come out in the news this morning. And if it's right, Paul, I think people need to be ready for the pain hasn't even really started yet in this story. So, soon as we come back, we'll talk about that. Markets are facing heightened uncertainty and thoughtful portfolio management has never been more important. If your current strategy relies solely on passive investing or diversification without active oversight, it may be time to consider a different approach. At Peak Financial Investing, we connect you with experienced wealth managers who actively manage portfolios using disciplined, research-driven strategies designed to adapt to evolving market conditions. Our focus is on helping clients navigate volatility with clarity and confidence. While no investment strategy can guarantee results or eliminate risk, we believe that preparation and active management can make a meaningful difference over time. Visit peakfinancialinvesting.com to schedule a complimentary consultation and explore whether our approach aligns with your goals. I'm Dr. Chris Martinson and I am proud to support Peak Financial Investing. This is not a guarantee of future performance, but a call to take your financial planning seriously. Again, that's peak financialvesting.com. Investing, of course, involves risk, including the potential loss of principle. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please consult with a qualified adviser before making investment decisions. All right, welcome back everybody. So, so this is actually Paul, this is one of the more concerning things I've seen. So, you know, I went down to to Panama to go see everybody coming out of the um uh jungle for when when we had the migrations happening a couple years ago. I'm no Panameanian expert, but I did take a trip right up the the Panameanian Canal and got to see all the infrastructure. It's really impressive. This is, of course, the artery cutting through Panama that'll connects the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and there's a whole very complicated piece of engineering. Really cool story. But ships come in, they go through a series of locks and then back down again. And they pay a million bucks a trip. And it turned out that China was operating a lot of the logistics companies because China is very good at logistics. And so that was that was then. Since then, obviously, United States is putting pressure on Cuba, but also has been putting pressure on Panama to see if they could get those pesky Chinese elbowed out. So, cue today's story. It turns out that China, uh, the the company's called Costco, COC, not COC, not not the thing I shop at. Costco is one of the largest, um, port hub manufacturers. We mentioned Mariski is the shipping line. Well, the people who take the things off of the boats, you know, all the containers, the TEUs, and then distribute them. That's the port logistics. They have all the big cranes. You could see in the picture there. So it turned out local media are reporting down there that Beijing warned of a heavy price for the if Panama forced the takeover of the facility from Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchinson. They did that and here's what happened. Uh this is from Bloomberg. The article reads, quote, "China Costco shipping corp suspended its services at Panama's Balboa port. Huge port. A local media report said after Beijing warned of a heavy price for the Central American country's forced takeover of the facility from Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutcherson Holdings Limited, the state-owned shipping giant announced its decision to halt all of its departures and arrivals at the port in a notice to customers dated March 10th yesterday. According to the report in La Prenza, while all confirmed bookings will be cancelled, cargo that has already arrived will be processed as normal. But that's it. This is going to create just a gigantic um mess for container logistics. >> Wow. So, no warning. Just, hey, we're done. Snap of a finger. That's it. We'll process who's in dock. Everybody else that's just about to get here, head in another direction. >> Go find somewhere else to handle all this stuff. You be you. >> Yeah. You know, we go in and just absolutely upend years of contracts and expect no consequences. And it's pretty brilliant on China's part at this point to wait till this moment in time where they can deliver maximum amount of pain into the just in time inventory system. >> Yep. Well, what if what if China makes the same announcement about trade with the United States just says, "Hey, you know, you you broke it. You refused to, you know, compensate anybody for having unilaterally decided to upend the world's entire energy market system and um you know, we can't do business with you anymore." Like if they did that, Paul, you just set an egg timer on our economy, you know, because it's not just all the cheap plastic things people think we get from China. China manufactures a lot of our heavy equipment, uh, you know, electronics, Cisco router systems for our internet, phones, you know, supply chains, intermediaries, all that stuff. I mean, let's just we all heard that that we lost three very expensive radar systems over there in the Persian Gulf in the opening salvos aran target and hit them. Apparently, each one of those requires like tens of pounds of something called gallium and element and China's like 98% of the source of that. So, if they said we're not sending you any more gallium, we're not rebuilding those radars. You know, we will lose that capability till we find a new source of gallium. Hard to come by, turns out, >> right? And China's got the pockets and the stores and the manufacturing capability to move right into that void that's left in in the US to provide security that the US has been disrupting unfortunately. >> Yeah, >> that's amazing to me just the dominoes that are falling in certain places right now. And and look, I I just want everybody to think just in time inventory going back to CO, right? When did anybody think that toilet paper would be a hard thing to get? But that's what happens in that just in time inventory in that shutdown. But we didn't have everything destroyed back then. It was a government shutdown, right? So the startup was a lot easier with the destruction that's taking place and relationships that are being terminated at this point because of our behavior. Um that's going to take a lot longer to restart. >> Yep. And and there'll be relative winners and losers. Surprisingly, the big winner so far is Russia. Uh, you know, cuz we we immediately lifted all the sanctions and all this stuff and allowed India to buy oil and and turns out Russia is going to, you know, a resourcerich country is going to probably do pretty well unless it decides to withhold those resources for same reasons we're describing here. Um, Europe is absolutely clobbered in this story. I I have I have pictures of so when 20% of the world's LG is taken offline. There's no like extra 20% capacity out there. There's no Australia doesn't dial up its production. Every when you have an LG plant, it's kind of operating at full cycle because it's a very capital intensive thing. They need to be operating all the time anyway. So, you might as well just keep those things running. It's not like we have spare ones. We'll just like, oh, you know, got a couple kicking. Let's just dust them off and we'll get those going. So, what's happening is a mad scramble for LG cargos. And I can show you there there pictures of of like what tracking these ships heading towards Europe and they go the other way because Asia outbid them because Taiwan was willing to pay more because >> oh, Japan wanted it more. O >> and they just U-turned and went the other way. And this I've seen a lot of shipments do that. Um so what's happening is there's a mad scramble for this stuff. Europe is absolutely at exceedingly low levels of of gas supplies and they need lots and lots of gas to come in and the US will supply I suppose what we can but we I don't think we we can make it up because they they got a lot from the Middle East as well but it doesn't matter because it's a global market. You've probably heard people say this kind of stuff. Oh, it doesn't matter Chris. We only got like 2% of our oil from Saudi Arabia. That's not how oil markets work. We might only get 2%, but oil's price is set at the margin on the open ocean because people are competing for things. And even if we only had 2% from there, it doesn't matter. China will begin bidding for whatever they can get their hands on. Everybody will be bidding for whatever they can get their hands on. The price will go up. Ours will go up. It's irrelevant how whether we got zero or one. It doesn't matter. as long as we have an export market, and we do, um, you know, we're subject to international forces. And and and that's what they're monkeying with here. Just try and crush all that down. Good luck. Yeah. Yeah. And there's so many pressure points that China can apply, right? If they get into a bidding war, just openly sell our treasuries, make it harder for for us to raise capital, and use the proceeds to outbid us on the other side. I mean, that's not a good position to be in. >> Hard to make sense of it all because it's happening so quickly. So, um, I don't know what you can do besides just, you know, be ready, react as appropriate, have have stops, have limits, no, you know, if if the narrative doesn't quite hold out or, you know, the wy coyote moment happens, you want definitely want to be sure that you're um responsive to that and preserving capital as we go forward. But it's going to be really hard to figure all this out and we're going to have to just see how things unfold, Paul, because I can't predict, not the for the life of me, I can't even predict what happens when you cut off Napa from a whole bunch of petrochemical plants. Like what happens next, you know? Don't know. We're going to have to find out. >> Yeah, you're right. If it continues, we're going to have to find out and we're going to experience the pain of whatever those consequences unfold. And more so for those investors who those individuals that are just not prepared for it in any way. and don't have resiliency. And and that kind of gets back, look, what what can we do as investors or what can we do individually right now? I think I talked about it uh last week and I can't stress this enough. Make sure you've got adequate emergency and savings funds and have them in the safest place that you can, right? I can't give open advice. You have to be prepared for metals if we have a major liquidation event to go down. But you want something that has no counterparty risk. that tier one asset or what was it you called it Chris? It was >> a tier zero asset. >> Tier zero asset. I can't believe I didn't remember that. Um, you know, and look, get you some food, get some food on hand because if there's supply chain disruptions and this expands out of control and we end up into, you know, a logistical World War II, you can be in World War II without bombs going all over the world just from a logistical supply chain standpoint. You know what's it going to hurt? So what if somebody makes fun of you? you got three months worth of food and they go, "Oh, you're a prepper." Well, I go back to CO and I had a few friends of mine that came over to the house and I had extra stock piles of of, you know, uh, toilet paper and paper towels and things like that. And I I they made fun of me and I smiled the whole time and I said, "There's going to be a day in the future potentially that you're going to need some." So, and of course, what happened? I had those same friends that made fun of me call and say, "Hey, uh, we can't get any toilet paper. How much you gonna charge me?" I'm like, "Well, I'm a good friend, so here you go." But, you know, the point is be resilient. You've got enough warning. The And I know you guys are probably sick of me saying this, the prudent perceive danger and hide themselves. And that's so important right now. Now, what's the worst case scenario? You go stock up on a little extra food in a in a matter of where you can rotate through your shelves. You buy some long-term freeze-dried food before everybody else has decided to do it. Hey, that's 50 years of security that you have set on the shelf. That's three months that you have in there. You rotate through that, right? So, hey, worst case scenario, we get sunshine and rainbows on the other side of this and you don't need it. Well, that's extra savings, right? You can build that back down. I'm not a big believer that you should build it down. I'm just saying worst case scenario you build that down and but it'll be the best decision that you ever made if this doesn't unfold perfectly and all of the evidence not only there Chris but you look at what's taking place in private equity what you listen to the layoffs that have been announced is it really because of AI or is it just easy for a CEO to blame it on AI um you know when there's other factors that are in there what if you lose your job you What if you're what if you're retired? Okay, you're set. You're in a good shape? What about your extended family members, your kids, your grandkids? You know, there there's a point where making good decisions and being prudent. So, I can't stress it enough for people out there right now. Be prudent. Be prudent. This is not a time to speculate and be a hero. Build yourself a solid foundation where you have some wherewithal because if if this continues as it's going, it's easy to see the outcome of very tumultuous times. And the better prepared you are, the easier you're going to come through it. We're all, you know, if this gets worst case scenario, we're not going to, nobody's going to come through unscathed. The question is, how much damage do you take? There's a difference between a cut that you have to put a band-aid on and a cut that that takes both of your hands off and for the rest of your life you're handicapped from that standpoint. Uh and never able to fully recover. So, I can't stress that enough. Sit down, make a list, you know, take the time to sit down and make a list. Okay? You know, what do I need to get through the next three months? How much money do I need to have set aside safely if I lost my job or if something happened economically where I can cover my necessities? Don't get yourself in a situation if you have a mortgage where you can lose that. Right? If it's so bad that 24 months worth of emergency funds, you exhaust yourself through that and then you end up losing your house. Well, you know what? You were the last person standing. Keep your head up because you were prudent. Don't be the first person to go down. So, you know, there's nothing wrong with being prudent in a period of time like this and and the prudent foresee danger. And if you can't see danger on the horizon right now, I'm sorry, you've got lying eyes. I'd ask the Lord to help you to see the truth and remove the scales from your eyes because we are being warned right now. We're being warned. You're warning uh uh people, Chris, as a watchman, and everybody has to make the decision that they they can as best for themselves. Now, I wouldn't go bar myself into oblivion to go do all these things. That's that's not an recommendation. That's not necessarily resilient. But if you got resources set aside, implement those in a manner that, hey, worst case scenario, you get made fun of a little bit by your friends. Hey, I was prudent. Best case scenario, you're there in a position to where first you can protect and care for yourself and your family, and then you have the opportunity to be a blessing to the community around you. >> Indeed. And then and I'm I'm going to have to bust out one of my my old saws when it comes to this topic, which is that Paul, in a true emergency, anything you do to prepare beforehand feels like a complete overreaction. And in hindsight, you realize it was a complete underreaction. That's the territory we have to sort of navigate because it does. It feels completely like, oh my gosh, this is I'm I'm just freaking out. I I'm just being a nervous Nelly. I'm overreacting, right? But of course, when you look back, you're going to realize, no, you no, you probably could have done more, you know? And and look, if these are things that you're going to use anyway, having some of them extra on hand, I don't I don't understand why this why it's it's somehow shameful for me to do that, have a deep pantry, a deep seller, when we expect the government to do that, right? Can you imagine if FEMA said, "Oh, we we forgot to put food in warehouses and CS for an emergency." We'd go, "Well, then you failed at your job." How is that any different from me in my own household? Why should I be somehow just exposed and vulnerable? Because I think the deal is I'm supposed to just trust that >> the big pe the the government has my best interest at heart. And again, if people haven't figured out your government doesn't have your best interest at heart at this point in time, >> I don't know what else to say. >> Go back to praying that the Lord will remove the scales from your eyes so that you can see. Right. Yeah. >> I mean, you know, sit down, uh, what is it Peterson says? Sit down on your bed and ask, "What can I do to make my life better?" >> That's a form of prayer, you know, and and look, it's easy to be consumed by fear. Don't let fear consume you. Feel it, but squash it down and think through logically. And then and then make your list the night before you go to bed. And one of the things I've done in the past, and this is a good, this has been a good test that has served me well, of course, I believe in prayer. So I I go to bed the night before and I'm not sure, right? And I feel fear. So I'm like, "Okay, Lord, I feel like this is what I'm supposed to do. When I wake up in the morning, if I'm if I'm on the right path, increase my conviction. When I wake up in the morning, if I'm missing the mark, completely take the the the concern and conviction away from me." And I've had it come out both ways. And I made the the right decision both times at those extremes. Make your list. Prepare your you know let yourself have the courage to imagine worst case scenario. And that doesn't mean you need to act now. But what are my decision lines? What I call them decision points. What is the trigger? This event happens. I do this. Okay. Like for me it's easy in the portfolios because when I look at things if this position crosses this line poof that's the sell point. Maybe I look like a fool. That's okay. But our responsibility is to run tactical uh riskmanage strategies for clients for keep them from getting wiped out on our watch if it's not absolutely different this time. So you have to make the best decision you can with the information you have at the time. Six months from now, we'll look back and go, "We should have done this, or we should have done that, or we did this, and that was right." Or, "Hey, you know, maybe I was a little ahead of myself, but guess what? Now, what's the fruit of the decision that I made if I'm 6 months back and and we get sunshine and rainbows on the other side of this?" Well, hey, now I'm rotating my stocks. I never have to worry about going out in the future. I'm going to always have three months worth of food on hand. And guess what? That's a part of my lifestyle. And I'm resilient. I've got this emergency fund over there. Hey, e economy is good, but somebody else made a mistake. So now I have opportunity money where I can move when somebody else may not have the ability. That's resilience. And we need to build resilience because look, I'm sorry, our government is not worth they're not trustworthy enough to put our hope of them caring for us completely. We have to be resilient on our own as as citizens in the nation and then hopefully our government does what's right. But uh but the problem is right now they've shown us enough information to say, "Hey, maybe they're not moving in our best interest." If you're in the top 1%, maybe they're moving in your best interest. But for the rest of us, we need to prepare and get some resiliency to make sure that we have some flexibility and freedom if things come apart. And and look, make fun of me all you want for that. That's good advice. And I mean, that's good advice from a long-term resiliency standpoint, regardless of what the income is in the next outcome is in the next, you know, 3 to 6 months. And all this stuff about the Iran war is obviously very um captivating and dynamic and all of that. But Paul, we still have all the other things lurking in the background that we've been talking about, which is what is the impact the disruptive impact of AI going to be on our children, on their jobs, on our prospects, like uh what is how do we deal with the fact that our stock market is priced for perfection and there's a lot of sort of imperfect things in the view at this point in time. There's a lot to consider here obviously and so I think getting through this next period is going to require really good information really solid like head on a swivel like you know 360 degree view of things believe in your own lion eyes over the narratives that they want to sell you right whether those are the equity market narratives or the MSNBC headlines um I mean here's one wake up and Yahoo Finance topofold IEA that's the international energy agency announces largest ever strategic oil You know what's funny about that, Paul? The IEA doesn't have a strategic oil to release. >> Oh, >> they don't even have one. >> They're just talk over you, but I saw that headline and I was like, "Oh, interesting. I didn't realize they didn't have a strategic oil release." So, thank you for that one. I'm sorry. >> They're they're just they're a little bureaucracy with a building in Belgium, you know, and and so Brussels somewhere. So, at any rate, they they they just announced that they think other countries should do this, right? Release their strategic oil. So that's what they've announced. Again, it's just part of the narrative game, right? And uh so that's the invitation. Believe your own lion eyes. Decide for yourself. Is this war growing or is it tapering off? You know, how long, you know, what are the impacts going to be? And I believe in just sort of like feeling my way through that poll because I can't analyze. This is a complex system. Nobody, if anybody says, "I know what's going to happen." They're not. Well, they're either diluting themselves or they're lying because these are complex systems. You just have to observe what's going to happen. All I know for sure is that when you starve a complex system for feed stocks and energy, you get all sorts of new emergent behaviors on the back end, right? It's just life. So, we're going to have to watch that. We're going to have to watch it very carefully. But, I do believe, Paul, that there's better times coming. I don't think it would be the worst thing if the market took a big old breather and went really far down because I would prefer personally that my kids have an opportunity to buy things that are cheap rather than hideously expensive. So, but that's just me, right? >> Right. And we reset, housing prices come down. You know, I'm not talking about great reset. I'm just talking about resetting to a sustainable long-term normal growth economy without all of the outside influence. But hey, regardless of what's going on in the Middle East, Chris, it's it it's pulling our attention over here. But Poly Market announces yesterday that Americans are taking hardship withdrawals out of their 401k at the largest level ever. >> So if the economy's that Yeah. ever. >> Whoa. >> So uh I'll read the headline here. I'll save you Sharon. Americans are now taking more hardship withdrawals from their 401k retirement accounts than at any time in history. So ever. History was the exact term. Well, on top of that, you've got all kinds of private credit issues. Let's see here. So, this is the Poly Market uh tweet that they put out here. Okay, so let's go over to um Tracy Shukart. Black Rockck slashes another private loan value. So, this was March the 5th from 100 to zero. So, she's she's putting out what what uh Bloomberg did. So, Black Rockck slashed the value of a private loan to Infinite Commerce Holdings to zero just three months after assessing it at 100 cents on the dollar. Okay. So, this loan is worthless. Marks the second sudden wipeout to recently hit Black Rockck's private credit division, highlighting a key fault line in private credit. Now, for those listeners out there that have seen that headline that Black Rockck's going to go bankrupt, this is an this doesn't have to do with Black Rockck itself. This is some of the funds that they investments they have in their funds. So I love what Melody Wright says. I'm losing count gradually than uh suddenly. >> So Black Rockck limits withdrawals as redemptions rattle private credit fund. That's Poly Market. Let's see which one this one is. >> FHA uh mortgage delinquencies continue to rise to 13.7% in January 2026 and they're actually accelerating. So January 2025 was 12.8, 8 January 2024 was uh 12.4 8.2 million homeowners on FHA alone are behind on their loans. 5.23% are over 90 days late. Half are seriously delinquent. So that's increasing. That's not getting better. If the economy was that good, the question is would you know we shouldn't be seeing a lot of that. And then of course on top of this, you know, Mario Newfall puts out Iranian state media, US tech giants in the region are fair targets. So I mean there's just a there's a lot of things that are taking place uh uh behind the surface that are dangerous to this narrative that the market is great and it's priced to perfection. I mean, it really is. is I mean I can go back and show that price to earnings ratio chart in a minute but just to get back to a fairly valued market it's a 50% decline. Okay, just to get back to an overvalued market because we're so extremely overvalued on the S&P 500 is a 30% decline. And assuming earnings hold up if we get to an undervalued market which we saw in the 1970s with the similar problems that we're having right now. Okay, that's a 70% decline. And and and if you think it can't happen, I'm sorry, you're being foolish. We hope it doesn't, and maybe it doesn't. There's forces that could keep it from getting there. But the reality is that's the mathematics of the risk associated with where we find ourselves in the market. So, um, this is a dangerous time. You got to be prudent. maybe we'll just turn Japanese and have the Federal Reserve buy our ETFs, right? So, it's always worth remembering, Paul, that that there are unthinkable things that will probably be thought um when the time comes, right? And it's it's but again, the purpose of a market is to be a price discounting mechanism and also to connect capital and it's supposed to send signals out there, right? So, if there were two banks in town and one of them had to offer me 12% and the other was offering me 4% on a savings account, there's information contained in that, right? H what's the 12% bank doing? Must be pretty risky for them to have to pay up so much to attract capital like that. So again, anytime we take our markets and and they become just um price setting arenas, right, where the Fed decides what the whole yield curve should look like or the Bank of Japan does that or they decide that maybe markets it would be awkward if they felt today so we're going to like do whatever we can to keep them propped up or this is the right price for copper or oil or silver or gold that when they do that they create these distortions, Paul, that ultimately make things over the long haul worse not better, right? So, weirdly enough, we're coming into this whole thing with oil with in the Middle East with the United States having publicly announced a year ago that we're entering peak oil is the twilight of our shale play is now hitting. It's not fantasy anymore. It's not fanfiction from peak oil doomsters. It's from the EIA, the Energy Information Agency in the US. This is reality. I would like our markets to begin to reflect reality because what did Dan Ran say? You know, you can ignore reality, but you can't ignore the consequences of ignoring reality. We're trying to ignore reality here by by pretending as if the narrative, the price narrative is actually the only one that matters. And of course, it does matter, but it's not the only thing that matters. And so, I think, yeah, we have to get back to some sense of reality here at some point, which may come courtesy of China saying, "Oh, here's the reality. We own all the supply chains for all the stuff you need." Like, yeah, we got those, you know, >> right? >> We forgot to build those. >> Yeah. For maximum profitability. >> Yep. All right. Well, you got anything else today or should should we leave it there? >> No, we should leave it there. I'm I'm I I I will say we're very very close to an official long-term sell signal on the S&P and the NASDAQ. Like, it could happen officially at the end of the month if if price action continues the same. Now, that doesn't mean that we're going to wait till the end of the month, you know, but when we're in this position, but typically when that happens, I I will tell people, hey, we're officially on a full defensive stance, and we're we're very close. You get there's times where we've gotten here before and it it goes on for a little bit longer, but our decision points are in place and and uh we'll not hesitate to act as information comes along. And more than likely, that's going to be defensively to protect capital. Well, I'm glad you're there doing that and I'm I'm I'm really glad that you can serve the clients the way you do with the riskmanaged approach. For anybody who might be interested in working with Paul and his team, please go to peakfinancialinvesting.com, fill out a very simple form, and within 48 business hours, somebody's from Paul's team will get back to you to schedule uh the first of three sessions together. an introductory call and then a uh planning call to get through that and then if it progresses from there into a recommendations call and then if that all seems to work I guess at that point you would say oh let's work together if that knits together. So peak financial investing.com with that Paul thank you so much for your time today and um go get some more sun looks good on you. >> Well thank you I'm looking forward to getting some this weekend. So for you and everybody out there, may the Lord grant us all wisdom, insight, and discernment for the days ahead. >> All right, with that, bye everybody. We'll see you next week. I'm sure it'll be an action-packed week. We'll have lots to talk about then, too. All right, bye for now.
Iran War Market Shock: Energy Prices, Shipping Risk And Supply Chain Fallout
Summary
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. For US investors that are just blindly following this modern portfolio theory, this is probably the greatest risk that I have seen and study in history and anything that I've walked through in the past 28 years. Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of Finance Hugh. I'm your host Chris Martinson back with Paul Ker of Kiker Wealth Management. And of course, we're going to have a lot to talk about because there is this little thing called a war going on in the Gulf region over there in Middle East. Paul, good to see you, buddy. >> Good to see you as well, Chris. >> Well, you're looking tanner than I am. We don't we haven't gotten to spring yet. So, >> well, I did get to spend a little uh uh long weekend and I actually got in the sun. I think it was several months there at the worst part of winter. I come in before daylight and I leave after uh after dark or after daylight's down so I don't see the sun for a couple of weeks. Feel more like a vampire. >> Well, I think everybody, we all need to do what we can do to try and stay calm and um kind of let this stuff wash over us. But I will tell you, Paul, that I'm as as alarmed as I've ever been in my life. And some people might say, "Well, of course, you're always seeing the risks." But I do believe in watching the risks as they unfold. It served me very well during the great financial crisis. I was ahead of the pack there. Served me well during COVID. I was ahead of the pack there. And it's going to serve me well here again, Paul. I have the same vibe, only this feels larger than either of those two events to me at this point in time. And I could try and make that case, but it's sort of a little qualitative. Like I I'm just the pace of the events. Every morning, Paul, I wake up and it's something new that's so dramatic that really should have like this enormous impact on markets yet there's no market action happening. That's the same experience I had as I was watching subprime bonds blow up in '08. As I watched COVID raising across the world and the market just for whatever reason was just calm and placid there in February of 2020. I think that's where we are again here. What are you thinking? >> No, I'm with you as well, Chris. And and look, thank you for your position of being a watchman. Uh it's a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing for those people that listen to you, but the stress that comes along with being a watchman is something that you have to actively fight off. >> But, you know, as you're talking about that, I'm thinking I think people should go back and watch The Big Short at this point if they've not seen it in quite some time. >> Yep. because because there is a period of time where the big players are are positioning behind the scenes to protect themselves and it obuscates what's taking place in the market and I too with you I am far more concerned right now than what I was in in 2008 because look equity markets took a huge hit but they were not as expensive as they are right now how it was isolated to housing but now we've got housing we've got the markets that are overpriced you've got private equity that's starting to blow up and that's just absolute hidden, you know, in the shadows, ticking time bomb. That's that's, you know, we've been talking about that for quite some time. So, we're literally in the everything bubble with the exception of commodities u and and some international investments. So, for us investors that are just blindly following this modern portfolio theory, this is probably the greatest risk that I have seen and study in history and anything that I've walked through in the past 28 years. Well, as we know, Paul, when when when markets are unnaturally calm, sort of the calm before the storm, right? So, let's talk about today, uh, it's the 11th of March at the at the time of this recording. So, I wake up this morning and I see this, right? Turns out Iranian drones reportedly struck oil storage tanks at the port of Salala in Oman. And yes, multiple tanks are are on fire here. And this has been sourced from multiple sources. So, this is real. It happened. Was it Iranian drones? Probably. But what I can tell you for sure is it's on fire. And it's it's really important here, Paul, because Oman has been left out of this more or less up to this point in time. Iran is has a they're sort of in a neutral relationship with Oman. So, they're keeping hands off. Now, it's hands-on. So, you know what happens? Like, if this had happened two years ago, Paul, oil goes limit up. It goes up, I don't know, 10 $15 right on the news because of what's implied here. But when we look over here at um let's see if we can find this. Yeah, we'll go here. Oil on the on that news poll. Nothing. It's the exact same. The the news came out right around here about 11. It's it's up a it's up a dollar maybe, but it's in this range. It's been stuck here for days now. Somewhere between 80 and 90. It's just bouncing around in there. can't can't seem to crack out above that 90 mark which is right there. So, somebody's holding it down. And I guess okay, that's a lot of power in that. But the problem is that when you manipulate markets like this, two things. You don't end up with supplies coming out of the ground, it doesn't send the right signals to people. I worry that people are looking at these prices, Paul, and interpreting that as reality and saying, "Oh, it can't be that bad because the price of oil isn't $200 a barrel, so it must be okay." It's clearly not okay in the trajectory of the war over there. And then the second thing that happens is eventually people find out that those are fake prices and that there's no delivery on the back end of those contracts and then you wreck your markets. So they are literally risking destroying US capital markets as a useful thing, a vehicle because how can you trust something that you know sets a fake price and then won't deliver when you demand delivery? I think that's what's coming. I I understand why they do it for optics, political reasons, narrative control, all that. But when you treat markets badly, Paul, I I think you end up breaking them. So I'm I'm worried that the United States is going to suddenly lose its premier sort of position as the world's financial center, >> right? >> Um and for good reason. >> Well, it's dishonest scales. What the market is supposed to be is a forward pricing mechanism. So it's supposed to be all knowing where all the players in their different positions are p taking their positioning and and it's supposed to be anticipating six months ahead what takes place. That's what we have been taught in in the education of the markets. That was the reality for a period of time. But but we also have some warnings and some types and shadows or birth pains. You take silver for a while. The question was, was it manipulated for a long period of time and then all of a sudden this price just breaks free and skyrockets higher? Well, that's the same thing that we run the risk with an oil. And it doesn't give the market time to to reposition and shield itself or investors to shield themselves ahead of time if you have this hidden hand for political propaganda purposes that is actually keeping its hand on that ball and holding it down, which makes it a whole lot worse on the citizenry of our country when they do lose control. And they will if if Iran has the capability to continue, like they said, they're not backing down. If they have the capa capability to continue to keep hitting these major points, you know, the port, right? I mean, that's where you bring it to to store it to get it shipped out. So, I mean, this this is a unbelievably risky environment right here. and the markets whistling Dixie through the graveyard absolutely complacent because of certain levers that they're able to put put apparently a hidden hand on. >> Well, it it's oil is there there's three big things we have to worry about in in the Gulf region, right? Oil is the one catches all the attention, but crude oil came out of there. Also, refined products came out. So, it was about 15 million barrels of crude, unrefined. And then the refined products which could be gasoline, diesel, NAPA, stuff that comes out of the refinery. Second would be uh natural gas, LNG. Now LNG, there really aren't strategic reserves of gas kicking around. Some countries do have gas stockpiles. So we do in the United States, we have these underground injection caverns. Europe has some of those same things, but a lot of Asia doesn't have that capability. So it was more of a hand-to-mouth just in time. You know, it has to keep flowing. And and that stopped. LG has completely stopped coming out now for what are we 9 days into this right at this point. Um and and already we're seeing huge problems with that and a lot of scrambling because there wasn't that much extra capacity. That's 20% of the world's LNG is gone and it's gone for 9 days now. If that goes on for just a few more days, you're going to have to see you're going to see countries starting to do triage. Meaning Germany they I know what their triage plan is. If they get below a certain critical level in their gas supplies, they shut off heavy industry first because they're heavy users and they kind of peel it back until finally the last thing they're defending is residential because they don't want people getting cold in their homes, right? So, so but they're going to have to make that same sort of triaging in all sorts of Asian countries like Japan and um uh Taiwan, Korea, etc. So, they're they're actually scrambling pretty hard right now. And then there are all these derivative products that we didn't know anything about till oh how much sulfur and sulfuric acid comes out of that region? Oh, critical amounts. It goes into all sorts of products. Oh, helium. Yep. Turns out helium is a byproduct of the LNG process. We freeze the gas down. That's how you get it to turn a gas into a liquid. You make it super cold. And that's minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit. And this gas that's left on top, which didn't freeze yet, is helium. So they skim that off. That goes to South Korea. They do what's called a 69's manufacturing process on it and get it to a 99.9999% purity. And then that goes into Taiwan's chipm and also South Korea's chipm processes. That is now stopped. So they're scrambling to try and figure out how they can do that. Point here is that we're seeing all sorts of derivative things, second order, third order effects. Hard to get our hands around it. But the idea that the stock market would say, you know, it's not really that big a deal. Um, here we can see, you know, hasn't this is the S&P sort of rounded off a little bit here, but since this thing started in March, that that's the total activity right there. Not even as bad as the tariff tantrum back here. Um, you know, in uh what was that? Um, February through April of last year. This is this is this is that why this just doesn't make any sense to me. Like >> no, >> somebody's not discounting anything. >> They're not the story. >> Well, and and and to be fair, I completely understand why investors are complacent right now. One, they're fully bought into passive. And if you're fully bought into passive, the large majority are the largest majority, then it doesn't matter if there's nukes in the air and you know that they're going to land an exchange, the rules of that strategy are you're passive. You do nothing. The second thing in addition to that is every time the market has started to roll over, you know, especially in the tariff situation, Trump goes from short-term pain, we're going to have to take this short-term pain to, oh, change my mind. Let's turn things around, right? or the Fed's been able to come in and bail out in the past. So, like Pavlov's dog, the large majority of investors have have been taught to freeze when they see environments like this because they're more concerned about missing upside opportunity than they are looking foolish because they sell and then Trump comes out and tells you you're a fool because you sold or or you know or or your neighbor tells you you're a fool because didn't you know the Fed was going to bail us out? So investors have been trained unfortunately to to do nothing in environments like this and and you know hey there are periods of time where it makes sense to do nothing right but this is not a period of time where you want to be um you don't want to let fear and emotion take over completely. You need to make logical decisions but you have to make a decision. Hey, what's worse if if this continues and and things come apart and the market goes a catastrophic event and we're down 30 40 50% and it ripples across the economy, you know, uh uh is that going to impact you in a lot more damaging way than having your feelings hurt if this does settle down? We're concerned over nothing. Let's say the hidden hand stops and Iran agrees to stop. Trump agrees to stop and we go back to holding hands in the world at that point and you miss 5% upside potential. Even if it's over right now, there's damage that's still going to continue to work through the economy and private credit is still an issue that's going to work its way through and we're really going to find the reality of that over the next 12 months. You know, that's that's the problem. But people aren't thinking critically at this point in general as you know, I'm just talking in general. Well, I I agree totally and I understand the complacency because of course the Fed always steps in and prints whenever they have to. So the idea is well they they're going to have to print here. The problem is is that the Fed I think has so one of the things the Fed can't do is aggressively print while inflation is raging. >> Right >> now you and I have talked about that so-called double hump inflation, right? The you know the 70s and 80s are going to be repeated by the 20s and the mid20s, right? Uh, and so if that comes true, well, what would make that come true? Well, obviously an energy supply shock that translates into energy price shocks that feeds into everything, right? We're already seeing really, really outsized increases in costs for things like fertilizer and feed stocks and plastics and on and on, right? So, that's all going to that shock is already in the python as they say, right? That that that's going to bleed through. And if it carries on for much longer and oil does go to 200 or 300 or 400 a barrel, the Fed, I think, is going to be handcuffed. I don't think they're going to be able to print like everybody expects them to because that's going to be they could risk something even worse than an economic downturn. They could be risking the very dollar itself at that point. And it's going to crush the markets at the same point too because that I mean what good's it going to do if you've got that cost push inflation that's coming through and the supply chain disruption that's taking place with these ports that are being struck in the Middle East. But I mean you take CO all the money that's printed then but people still trying to operate and function in society. It's going to have far worse inflationary effects if they just start printing money like crazy and then capital fleeing out of the United States. It's a very precarious situation right now. >> Well, we've already saw it like so it it finally got revealed, I think, to the world that the silver market was heavily manipulated, right? And it had been for a long time and people sort of wrapped their heads around that. And what we saw was the volume of trading on the comics and silver has just been shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. They they relaxed the margin requirements to try and get some of these people back. But Paul, once you wreck a market, once people decide this roulette table has a magnet under the wheel and I'm not playing anymore, >> they don't come back very easily. And that's what I keep talking about is this. I have a hard time putting into words, but one should not lightly destroy one's capital markets for little short-term political gain. Let's rig it for a little while. I have to make a couple bucks this quarter, but you know, that's killing the goose that laid the golden egg. like this is our capital markets are one of our most important assets to the prosperity of this country and if those suddenly fall apart for really dumb reasons I think there ought to be massive penalties for people who engage in such behavior. >> No, absolutely. I mean that life sentences with that, you know, because of the consequences and all the people that it's going to affect around the globe because of those lies. And really, Chris, it comes down to the point, you know, I think we've talked about before, um, I don't know who to attribute the quote to, but the reality is you can sp you can spend a lifetime building a reputation by operating in good character, right? or if you're just building a reputation at some point that your your lack of character underneath is going to cause you to destroy that lifetime of a reputation and then you may not have a whole lifetime to rebuild that. So, we've had all of this period of time where the US used to, hey, our markets were liquid, our markets were honest, our markets were held to a good standard. That's what we built upon in the past. But now you've got weak men who don't allow these honest markets to take place, which is distorting a signal for people that are still trusting these markets to make financial decisions for themselves, their families, their states, their nations, their communities. And that's my concern. I mean, you know, we have to play the game by the rules that are forced upon us. But the reality is we have to be wise to where it is too and protect ourselves by by by walking a different path. And there's very few people walking a different path by running riskmanaged, tactical, adapted portfolios and then sometimes just saying, "Hey, I'm going to set my pride down. I may be wrong. I may miss a little bit of opportunity right here uh over the next three or four months, but there's a big difference between missed opportunity and lost capital. Missed opportunity is a lot easier to make up for. Lost capital is a lot harder because a 50% decline in the market means you have the arithmetic of a loss. You have to make a 100% to get back to even. So let's say you got a million dollars in your portfolio. You lose 50%. Now you've got 500,000. 50% return gets you back to 750. You have to have a 100% return to get back to even. So, I mean, that's a decade. That's one of the reasons why you look back historically, it's highly likely that we have a decade of zero returns in the S&P 500 if if there's any lessons to be learned from history just from the mathematics of how this euphoria and this complacency has caused the market to be overpriced. You add other events on top of this. You know, if we go back to that lower end of that range, that's a 70% decline. That's not outside the realm of possibility when a system that is completely financialized and absolutely running on just in time inventory for maximum profitability. One thing breaks, it can ripple across the whole system and take decades to recover. >> Well said. And Paul, when we come back, I think we're going to take a look at this. I I think we have um I think Trump just admitted that they've been monkeying with the markets and so we'll hear about that as soon as we come back. Today's markets are more volatile than ever with ongoing economic and geopolitical uncertainty. Navigating such environments requires thoughtful adaptive strategies, not a one-sizefits-all approach. At Peak Financial Investing, our registered investment advisory firm connects clients with experienced wealth managers who focus on active portfolio management. These professionals use evidence-based strategies designed to respond to changing conditions, not outdated formulas, but customized approaches grounded in research, discipline, and risk awareness. We believe in open, informed conversations, including discussing tools like precious metals and diversification as part of a broader financial strategy. Every investor's situation is unique, and our advisers tailor their guidance accordingly. Visit peakfinancialinvesting.com today to schedule your free consultation and explore how proactive management can support your financial goals. I'm Dr. I'm Chris Martinson. Proud to work with Peak Financial Investing and my support reflects my professional views. I encourage you to take control of your financial future by making informed decisions. All right, welcome back everybody. Um, explosive sort of an allegation there. Let's listen very carefully to what what Trump says here. He just said this this morning. I apologize for the music. I did not put the music on here. Um, this music is uh put on by the White House itself. In recent years, the regime and its terror proxies have launched attacks on hundreds of commercial vessels. We're putting an end to all of this threat once and for all, and the result will be lower oil prices, oil and gas prices for American families. We've done that. We've done it. We've brought it very low. This was >> We've done that. We've brought it very low. So, I don't know what he's talking about because oil is basically up close to 50% um from where it was before somebody made the decision of choice to attack Iran. Um what do you think he what do you think he meant there when he said we we've done that. We've brought it very low because we saw oil hit $119 a barrel and it got just crushed by somebody selling a whole lot of oil in the markets uh over the next hour and a half. One thing that I did notice, it looks like he's reading from his script, but when he, you know, when he looks up, he's going off script and saying, "Hey, just to reiterate the point, we've done that. We brought it very low." >> I don't I don't know what that means, but but I it doesn't look like that was necessarily on his script. Maybe it was, right? >> Interesting. >> But it's a thought. Um, >> you know, maybe being completely honest. Yeah. I'll see >> once and for all and the result will be lower oil prices, oil and gas prices for American families. We've done that. We've done it. We brought it very low. This was just an excursion into something that had to be done. >> Also, the minimization there of the excursion of something that just had to be done. Um I don't think he's made the case yet from certainly hasn't to me as to what the imminence was that required all of this to happen. Um, and and that's the a concerning part to me here, Paul, is that >> we're getting very close to finish. >> He says we're getting very close to finishing that here. Like, wait, what's the strategy? Like, I don't know where we're going or what what success would look like or what the strategy is or nobody seems to know, right? Um, and so that's a concern here. And markets aren't supposed to like that sort of indecision that that that they don't like that uncertainty, right? I'm just not our markets are about as certain as they could be. this is all going to finish soon and we're getting right back to our regularly scheduled programming, you know, and I'm just I'm not seeing it at this point. We can cover some of the more data, but I I have not every single day, you know, as my friend Michael Yan says, he says, "Wars only do two things. They grow and then they grow out of control." Right. So, it still feels like we're in the grow stage and maybe close to the out of control stage, but that's just what I see out here in the cheap seeds. >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean you you hear the reports that hey, we're this thing's nearly over. What there was a headline the Trump administration came out today and said there's really not much to hit. We're close to the end of this. That's not exactly what he said, but that's the gist of what was said. But you know the thing that bothers me about their lack of abil his lack of ability their lack of ability to explain exactly why and I've seen this when I do plans and I talk with people in the retirement planning process uh is we show people why they have to do something you know we show people why you have to make this sacrifice right look if you want to if you want to retire at 65 you're going to have to make this sacrifice now you're going to have to save x amount of dollars you're going to have to be disciplined or hey, if you want to work till 80, continue to do what you're doing. So, you know, I I didn't I wasn't able to phrase it the way Jordan Peterson said one time. He said, if you can explain to someone the why that they need to do something, they can handle all of the discipline and pain that comes through and getting there. And that's my biggest concern about the communication that's coming out. I haven't heard an exact reason of why exactly why. right at this point. If they had nukes, I would have thought they have used them already. Maybe they're holding them for later if they have them. But, um, you know, that bothers me. Why are we in the midst of this? Why? Especially with the precariousness of our markets already and how overpriced they are, the economic consequences can be severe, you know, which leads me to believe and theorize, well, maybe they understand these markets are kind of reaching the end and this is an excuse to point the finger at somebody else and blame it on them or at least try to. I mentioned there are variety of things that you you know the LNG the this that um but also the whole region is served by container ships both bringing food in and other things out. Um and so we have here uh a container ship hit by an unknown projectile. You see it's smashed into this one a midship here caused a lot of damage. Um and then we also have uh here a US flagged oil tanker um yesterday and a Portuguese flagged container ship the so long uh all kind of on fire here. Again, Paul, these should have been like absolute like like market moving things. And if we come here, this one also the Mayori Nari Bangkok flag tanker. And this one, by the way, Paul, has a big old hole in the side right here that looks more like one thing we haven't seen Iran use yet, but I'm wondering if they busted them out, is anti-hship missiles. Uh, the whole idea that, you know, there was this um really bizarre event yesterday, which I'm sure you saw. The energy secretary, Chris Wright, tweets out that a US naval vessel had escorted a tanker through the Gulf. oil prices got slammed 19% in on the back of that tweet and then they had to that was a fake tweet. They said, "Oh, it was an intern put that out. Market moving event." Didn't say they fired the intern. Didn't explain if anybody in the administration managed to put oil shorts on and closed them over that. That was a market moving tweet and it was wrong. Fantastically wrong. Right. Um and Iran immediately came out and put out a tweet that trolled us, you know. So this whole thing's kind of being uh uh running kind of fun but in a funny way. But we have imagine the lack of controls you have when you accidentally send out not just a market moving tweet but one that is so fantastically geopolitically laden. This idea that a naval a naval boat had escorted a US naval asset had escorted a ship. It speaks to a really profound either lack of control or they're just doing stuff that um is worse than I can even imagine, which is monkeying with the markets to make a few bucks for them and their families. I don't know. But if I sent that tweet out, buddy, I'd have SEC lawyers knocking on my door. Oh my goodness. You think about the restrictions that we have sometimes, at least from my side, being licensed on what you can say and what you can't say. I mean, yeah, you're exactly right. because it doesn't fit their narrative unfortunately. >> Right? >> And a lot of people would have lost money o over that fake tweet and a lot of people would have made a lot of money if you were short right before that tweet. All right. So some other things that are going on that we have to talk about from a market standpoint. So Shell just declared force majour on his liqufied natural gas contracts with some of its customers in Asia. Force majour act of god means that it it's a contract clause that that sits in there which basically says hey look whatever we promised you it's just we can rip that up now it rips it up for both parties so it it's companies are usually pretty loathed to declare force majour you really only do it when you really have to because the next thing your former customers do is they go find a new supplier and then you're going to have to woo them back from that at some point in the future if you can. So this isn't something that companies just sort of like throw out to save a couple bucks, you know, because they can't deliver. It's a pretty big deal. So I've been seeing force majour is like now something that's every single day there's new companies declaring force majour is the supply chains ripple out and get hit starting with LG, starting with petroleum products, rippling all the way through, but also we're seeing it in um URA. Let's see where's that one? Um yeah, so fertilizer URA prices are starting to spike pretty good here. And so we could get a fertilizer crisis. Wor worst possible time cuz it's March. This is normally when you buy fertilizer and begin applying it to fields in the northern hemisphere. Um so there's going to be a lot of a lot of pain around that. I've already seen US farmers starting to demand relief from all this somehow because they're just getting whipsawed like crazy on this. And so we'll see what happens with that. But this is just starting this sort of ripple effect and it goes through uh here. This was a great chart somebody pointed out. So oil and gas comes out uh and you turn it into feed stocks. Butane, Napa, condensates, natural gas, propane, ethane. These are feed stocks that then go into big refinery. I mean big petrochemical plants and get turned into basic chemicals. You get ammonia which can be used as a fertilizer, butine, ethylene which are used in plastics, propyline, plastics, um all this stuff and then it goes into the chemical intermediates, right? Which then get turned into things, final products like industrial chemicals and paints and synthetic rubbers and explosives and resins and foams and dyes and all sorts of things, soaps and detergents. So, so this whole this is what actually just got force masured all across Asia because they ran out of this stuff at this level of of the overall um supply chain process. So everything downstream sort of gets hit from that as we mentioned before. It just means of the of the stocks that are out there, they get cost push inflation gets very expensive. And this of course creates a lot of trouble for the Federal Reserve and its ability to even contemplate relfying everything which is pumping money into the markets. But they might anyway, but won't be good for average families. >> No, it's not going to be good for average families. And that means that, you know, I was talking with several people uh over the weekend and they're like, you know, we had a little bit of a reprieve in food prices, but you know, food prices have reacelerated again. And this just means that there's potential reaceleration again or further acceleration of food prices later in the year as that cost push inflation works its way through the system. And and that's a big deal right here at planting season. It is. And companies are going to have one of two choices. If you're a farmer that's barely making ends meet and and the difference between, you know, paying is bankruptcy, then maybe you don't put as much fertilizer out, which means you don't get as much of a yield, which means less goods. If the Fed prints on top of that, that's more money chasing less goods, which means even worse inflation potentially. So, I mean, it seems that the Fed is trapped in a corner at this point because we don't have the deflationary aspects of the 2008 crisis still in the system now where they could print that money and get away with it. So, now when they print that money, there's near instant, you know, uh, what they call, they want to call reliquation or inflationary pressures is the way I want to put it, working its way into the system. On one end, we can talk about how, okay, you know, container ships are getting hit and so there, you know, they're going to pull back. Marisk is the largest shipping company in the world. They have the most ships. And they put out a memo yesterday, I think, that said to all their former Gulf clients, and I say former because they said they're going to immediately and completely suspend all pickups, drop offs, they're not doing any shipping till March 26. and then they'll reconsider assuming you if the war is still going on but after seeing the container ships it just got struck with missiles we just talked about. So Maris is saying no okay no more shipping to this region now this is this gets hard because the region needs stuff coming and going all the time food coming in principally and and their products leaving. So this is a very very big deal and the logistics behind that even if you said like you say okay peace breaks out tonight it's all rainbows and unicorns tomorrow it will be months two two months before the logistics is sort of unsnarled and it'll take month at least a month to get LG back up uh fully going and we don't know how long it's going to take to get uh oil back running because they had to shut down a bunch of fields and it's a very complicated process to start them up without dam damaging them and um your long-term u you know irr you get out of that. So this is a mess oi and by the way I just I I got to reiterate this. This was a war of choice. This was a decision some people made. They've tried to sell it to us as it was imminent you know and and I saw Tom Cotton on on um the senator and he said well it's you know we we've been facing an imminent threat for 47 years from Iran. Like dude, nothing can be imminent for 47 years. >> Right. >> It's just not how words work, you know? >> Right. Right. >> So, >> I I even my point here is even if this stops right now, Paul, the the ripple effects are going to be lasting months. >> And it makes and and look, when a market's priced to perfection, you have to have a perfect outcome to continue the path that we're on. and we're not getting a perfect outcome right now. And that makes it even more challenging to keep things going um as the way investors are expecting right now. I mean, we're at a point where a 2% decline on the S&P people act like it's a a 2008 decline. I can only imagine how they're going to act, you know, if if if these plates start dropping as this works its way through the system. So the big concern I've had is is that you know what if the rest of the world like China and Russia principally but India too a lot of Asia say look United States and and Israel this was this was kind of a war of choice but we're going to have to bear the consequences of this right and so to the extent that that that we're just sort of like saying oh well it was all about us we we wanted to do this so we did it everybody else has to eat the consequences my concern Paul has always been that what if those other countries Oh, well, we don't want to trade with you anymore. You know, you've just made it too difficult to do business with you. What would what would happen? And I think we saw um the first hint of that come out in the news this morning. And if it's right, Paul, I think people need to be ready for the pain hasn't even really started yet in this story. So, soon as we come back, we'll talk about that. Markets are facing heightened uncertainty and thoughtful portfolio management has never been more important. If your current strategy relies solely on passive investing or diversification without active oversight, it may be time to consider a different approach. At Peak Financial Investing, we connect you with experienced wealth managers who actively manage portfolios using disciplined, research-driven strategies designed to adapt to evolving market conditions. Our focus is on helping clients navigate volatility with clarity and confidence. While no investment strategy can guarantee results or eliminate risk, we believe that preparation and active management can make a meaningful difference over time. Visit peakfinancialinvesting.com to schedule a complimentary consultation and explore whether our approach aligns with your goals. I'm Dr. Chris Martinson and I am proud to support Peak Financial Investing. This is not a guarantee of future performance, but a call to take your financial planning seriously. Again, that's peak financialvesting.com. Investing, of course, involves risk, including the potential loss of principle. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Please consult with a qualified adviser before making investment decisions. All right, welcome back everybody. So, so this is actually Paul, this is one of the more concerning things I've seen. So, you know, I went down to to Panama to go see everybody coming out of the um uh jungle for when when we had the migrations happening a couple years ago. I'm no Panameanian expert, but I did take a trip right up the the Panameanian Canal and got to see all the infrastructure. It's really impressive. This is, of course, the artery cutting through Panama that'll connects the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and there's a whole very complicated piece of engineering. Really cool story. But ships come in, they go through a series of locks and then back down again. And they pay a million bucks a trip. And it turned out that China was operating a lot of the logistics companies because China is very good at logistics. And so that was that was then. Since then, obviously, United States is putting pressure on Cuba, but also has been putting pressure on Panama to see if they could get those pesky Chinese elbowed out. So, cue today's story. It turns out that China, uh, the the company's called Costco, COC, not COC, not not the thing I shop at. Costco is one of the largest, um, port hub manufacturers. We mentioned Mariski is the shipping line. Well, the people who take the things off of the boats, you know, all the containers, the TEUs, and then distribute them. That's the port logistics. They have all the big cranes. You could see in the picture there. So it turned out local media are reporting down there that Beijing warned of a heavy price for the if Panama forced the takeover of the facility from Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchinson. They did that and here's what happened. Uh this is from Bloomberg. The article reads, quote, "China Costco shipping corp suspended its services at Panama's Balboa port. Huge port. A local media report said after Beijing warned of a heavy price for the Central American country's forced takeover of the facility from Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutcherson Holdings Limited, the state-owned shipping giant announced its decision to halt all of its departures and arrivals at the port in a notice to customers dated March 10th yesterday. According to the report in La Prenza, while all confirmed bookings will be cancelled, cargo that has already arrived will be processed as normal. But that's it. This is going to create just a gigantic um mess for container logistics. >> Wow. So, no warning. Just, hey, we're done. Snap of a finger. That's it. We'll process who's in dock. Everybody else that's just about to get here, head in another direction. >> Go find somewhere else to handle all this stuff. You be you. >> Yeah. You know, we go in and just absolutely upend years of contracts and expect no consequences. And it's pretty brilliant on China's part at this point to wait till this moment in time where they can deliver maximum amount of pain into the just in time inventory system. >> Yep. Well, what if what if China makes the same announcement about trade with the United States just says, "Hey, you know, you you broke it. You refused to, you know, compensate anybody for having unilaterally decided to upend the world's entire energy market system and um you know, we can't do business with you anymore." Like if they did that, Paul, you just set an egg timer on our economy, you know, because it's not just all the cheap plastic things people think we get from China. China manufactures a lot of our heavy equipment, uh, you know, electronics, Cisco router systems for our internet, phones, you know, supply chains, intermediaries, all that stuff. I mean, let's just we all heard that that we lost three very expensive radar systems over there in the Persian Gulf in the opening salvos aran target and hit them. Apparently, each one of those requires like tens of pounds of something called gallium and element and China's like 98% of the source of that. So, if they said we're not sending you any more gallium, we're not rebuilding those radars. You know, we will lose that capability till we find a new source of gallium. Hard to come by, turns out, >> right? And China's got the pockets and the stores and the manufacturing capability to move right into that void that's left in in the US to provide security that the US has been disrupting unfortunately. >> Yeah, >> that's amazing to me just the dominoes that are falling in certain places right now. And and look, I I just want everybody to think just in time inventory going back to CO, right? When did anybody think that toilet paper would be a hard thing to get? But that's what happens in that just in time inventory in that shutdown. But we didn't have everything destroyed back then. It was a government shutdown, right? So the startup was a lot easier with the destruction that's taking place and relationships that are being terminated at this point because of our behavior. Um that's going to take a lot longer to restart. >> Yep. And and there'll be relative winners and losers. Surprisingly, the big winner so far is Russia. Uh, you know, cuz we we immediately lifted all the sanctions and all this stuff and allowed India to buy oil and and turns out Russia is going to, you know, a resourcerich country is going to probably do pretty well unless it decides to withhold those resources for same reasons we're describing here. Um, Europe is absolutely clobbered in this story. I I have I have pictures of so when 20% of the world's LG is taken offline. There's no like extra 20% capacity out there. There's no Australia doesn't dial up its production. Every when you have an LG plant, it's kind of operating at full cycle because it's a very capital intensive thing. They need to be operating all the time anyway. So, you might as well just keep those things running. It's not like we have spare ones. We'll just like, oh, you know, got a couple kicking. Let's just dust them off and we'll get those going. So, what's happening is a mad scramble for LG cargos. And I can show you there there pictures of of like what tracking these ships heading towards Europe and they go the other way because Asia outbid them because Taiwan was willing to pay more because >> oh, Japan wanted it more. O >> and they just U-turned and went the other way. And this I've seen a lot of shipments do that. Um so what's happening is there's a mad scramble for this stuff. Europe is absolutely at exceedingly low levels of of gas supplies and they need lots and lots of gas to come in and the US will supply I suppose what we can but we I don't think we we can make it up because they they got a lot from the Middle East as well but it doesn't matter because it's a global market. You've probably heard people say this kind of stuff. Oh, it doesn't matter Chris. We only got like 2% of our oil from Saudi Arabia. That's not how oil markets work. We might only get 2%, but oil's price is set at the margin on the open ocean because people are competing for things. And even if we only had 2% from there, it doesn't matter. China will begin bidding for whatever they can get their hands on. Everybody will be bidding for whatever they can get their hands on. The price will go up. Ours will go up. It's irrelevant how whether we got zero or one. It doesn't matter. as long as we have an export market, and we do, um, you know, we're subject to international forces. And and and that's what they're monkeying with here. Just try and crush all that down. Good luck. Yeah. Yeah. And there's so many pressure points that China can apply, right? If they get into a bidding war, just openly sell our treasuries, make it harder for for us to raise capital, and use the proceeds to outbid us on the other side. I mean, that's not a good position to be in. >> Hard to make sense of it all because it's happening so quickly. So, um, I don't know what you can do besides just, you know, be ready, react as appropriate, have have stops, have limits, no, you know, if if the narrative doesn't quite hold out or, you know, the wy coyote moment happens, you want definitely want to be sure that you're um responsive to that and preserving capital as we go forward. But it's going to be really hard to figure all this out and we're going to have to just see how things unfold, Paul, because I can't predict, not the for the life of me, I can't even predict what happens when you cut off Napa from a whole bunch of petrochemical plants. Like what happens next, you know? Don't know. We're going to have to find out. >> Yeah, you're right. If it continues, we're going to have to find out and we're going to experience the pain of whatever those consequences unfold. And more so for those investors who those individuals that are just not prepared for it in any way. and don't have resiliency. And and that kind of gets back, look, what what can we do as investors or what can we do individually right now? I think I talked about it uh last week and I can't stress this enough. Make sure you've got adequate emergency and savings funds and have them in the safest place that you can, right? I can't give open advice. You have to be prepared for metals if we have a major liquidation event to go down. But you want something that has no counterparty risk. that tier one asset or what was it you called it Chris? It was >> a tier zero asset. >> Tier zero asset. I can't believe I didn't remember that. Um, you know, and look, get you some food, get some food on hand because if there's supply chain disruptions and this expands out of control and we end up into, you know, a logistical World War II, you can be in World War II without bombs going all over the world just from a logistical supply chain standpoint. You know what's it going to hurt? So what if somebody makes fun of you? you got three months worth of food and they go, "Oh, you're a prepper." Well, I go back to CO and I had a few friends of mine that came over to the house and I had extra stock piles of of, you know, uh, toilet paper and paper towels and things like that. And I I they made fun of me and I smiled the whole time and I said, "There's going to be a day in the future potentially that you're going to need some." So, and of course, what happened? I had those same friends that made fun of me call and say, "Hey, uh, we can't get any toilet paper. How much you gonna charge me?" I'm like, "Well, I'm a good friend, so here you go." But, you know, the point is be resilient. You've got enough warning. The And I know you guys are probably sick of me saying this, the prudent perceive danger and hide themselves. And that's so important right now. Now, what's the worst case scenario? You go stock up on a little extra food in a in a matter of where you can rotate through your shelves. You buy some long-term freeze-dried food before everybody else has decided to do it. Hey, that's 50 years of security that you have set on the shelf. That's three months that you have in there. You rotate through that, right? So, hey, worst case scenario, we get sunshine and rainbows on the other side of this and you don't need it. Well, that's extra savings, right? You can build that back down. I'm not a big believer that you should build it down. I'm just saying worst case scenario you build that down and but it'll be the best decision that you ever made if this doesn't unfold perfectly and all of the evidence not only there Chris but you look at what's taking place in private equity what you listen to the layoffs that have been announced is it really because of AI or is it just easy for a CEO to blame it on AI um you know when there's other factors that are in there what if you lose your job you What if you're what if you're retired? Okay, you're set. You're in a good shape? What about your extended family members, your kids, your grandkids? You know, there there's a point where making good decisions and being prudent. So, I can't stress it enough for people out there right now. Be prudent. Be prudent. This is not a time to speculate and be a hero. Build yourself a solid foundation where you have some wherewithal because if if this continues as it's going, it's easy to see the outcome of very tumultuous times. And the better prepared you are, the easier you're going to come through it. We're all, you know, if this gets worst case scenario, we're not going to, nobody's going to come through unscathed. The question is, how much damage do you take? There's a difference between a cut that you have to put a band-aid on and a cut that that takes both of your hands off and for the rest of your life you're handicapped from that standpoint. Uh and never able to fully recover. So, I can't stress that enough. Sit down, make a list, you know, take the time to sit down and make a list. Okay? You know, what do I need to get through the next three months? How much money do I need to have set aside safely if I lost my job or if something happened economically where I can cover my necessities? Don't get yourself in a situation if you have a mortgage where you can lose that. Right? If it's so bad that 24 months worth of emergency funds, you exhaust yourself through that and then you end up losing your house. Well, you know what? You were the last person standing. Keep your head up because you were prudent. Don't be the first person to go down. So, you know, there's nothing wrong with being prudent in a period of time like this and and the prudent foresee danger. And if you can't see danger on the horizon right now, I'm sorry, you've got lying eyes. I'd ask the Lord to help you to see the truth and remove the scales from your eyes because we are being warned right now. We're being warned. You're warning uh uh people, Chris, as a watchman, and everybody has to make the decision that they they can as best for themselves. Now, I wouldn't go bar myself into oblivion to go do all these things. That's that's not an recommendation. That's not necessarily resilient. But if you got resources set aside, implement those in a manner that, hey, worst case scenario, you get made fun of a little bit by your friends. Hey, I was prudent. Best case scenario, you're there in a position to where first you can protect and care for yourself and your family, and then you have the opportunity to be a blessing to the community around you. >> Indeed. And then and I'm I'm going to have to bust out one of my my old saws when it comes to this topic, which is that Paul, in a true emergency, anything you do to prepare beforehand feels like a complete overreaction. And in hindsight, you realize it was a complete underreaction. That's the territory we have to sort of navigate because it does. It feels completely like, oh my gosh, this is I'm I'm just freaking out. I I'm just being a nervous Nelly. I'm overreacting, right? But of course, when you look back, you're going to realize, no, you no, you probably could have done more, you know? And and look, if these are things that you're going to use anyway, having some of them extra on hand, I don't I don't understand why this why it's it's somehow shameful for me to do that, have a deep pantry, a deep seller, when we expect the government to do that, right? Can you imagine if FEMA said, "Oh, we we forgot to put food in warehouses and CS for an emergency." We'd go, "Well, then you failed at your job." How is that any different from me in my own household? Why should I be somehow just exposed and vulnerable? Because I think the deal is I'm supposed to just trust that >> the big pe the the government has my best interest at heart. And again, if people haven't figured out your government doesn't have your best interest at heart at this point in time, >> I don't know what else to say. >> Go back to praying that the Lord will remove the scales from your eyes so that you can see. Right. Yeah. >> I mean, you know, sit down, uh, what is it Peterson says? Sit down on your bed and ask, "What can I do to make my life better?" >> That's a form of prayer, you know, and and look, it's easy to be consumed by fear. Don't let fear consume you. Feel it, but squash it down and think through logically. And then and then make your list the night before you go to bed. And one of the things I've done in the past, and this is a good, this has been a good test that has served me well, of course, I believe in prayer. So I I go to bed the night before and I'm not sure, right? And I feel fear. So I'm like, "Okay, Lord, I feel like this is what I'm supposed to do. When I wake up in the morning, if I'm if I'm on the right path, increase my conviction. When I wake up in the morning, if I'm missing the mark, completely take the the the concern and conviction away from me." And I've had it come out both ways. And I made the the right decision both times at those extremes. Make your list. Prepare your you know let yourself have the courage to imagine worst case scenario. And that doesn't mean you need to act now. But what are my decision lines? What I call them decision points. What is the trigger? This event happens. I do this. Okay. Like for me it's easy in the portfolios because when I look at things if this position crosses this line poof that's the sell point. Maybe I look like a fool. That's okay. But our responsibility is to run tactical uh riskmanage strategies for clients for keep them from getting wiped out on our watch if it's not absolutely different this time. So you have to make the best decision you can with the information you have at the time. Six months from now, we'll look back and go, "We should have done this, or we should have done that, or we did this, and that was right." Or, "Hey, you know, maybe I was a little ahead of myself, but guess what? Now, what's the fruit of the decision that I made if I'm 6 months back and and we get sunshine and rainbows on the other side of this?" Well, hey, now I'm rotating my stocks. I never have to worry about going out in the future. I'm going to always have three months worth of food on hand. And guess what? That's a part of my lifestyle. And I'm resilient. I've got this emergency fund over there. Hey, e economy is good, but somebody else made a mistake. So now I have opportunity money where I can move when somebody else may not have the ability. That's resilience. And we need to build resilience because look, I'm sorry, our government is not worth they're not trustworthy enough to put our hope of them caring for us completely. We have to be resilient on our own as as citizens in the nation and then hopefully our government does what's right. But uh but the problem is right now they've shown us enough information to say, "Hey, maybe they're not moving in our best interest." If you're in the top 1%, maybe they're moving in your best interest. But for the rest of us, we need to prepare and get some resiliency to make sure that we have some flexibility and freedom if things come apart. And and look, make fun of me all you want for that. That's good advice. And I mean, that's good advice from a long-term resiliency standpoint, regardless of what the income is in the next outcome is in the next, you know, 3 to 6 months. And all this stuff about the Iran war is obviously very um captivating and dynamic and all of that. But Paul, we still have all the other things lurking in the background that we've been talking about, which is what is the impact the disruptive impact of AI going to be on our children, on their jobs, on our prospects, like uh what is how do we deal with the fact that our stock market is priced for perfection and there's a lot of sort of imperfect things in the view at this point in time. There's a lot to consider here obviously and so I think getting through this next period is going to require really good information really solid like head on a swivel like you know 360 degree view of things believe in your own lion eyes over the narratives that they want to sell you right whether those are the equity market narratives or the MSNBC headlines um I mean here's one wake up and Yahoo Finance topofold IEA that's the international energy agency announces largest ever strategic oil You know what's funny about that, Paul? The IEA doesn't have a strategic oil to release. >> Oh, >> they don't even have one. >> They're just talk over you, but I saw that headline and I was like, "Oh, interesting. I didn't realize they didn't have a strategic oil release." So, thank you for that one. I'm sorry. >> They're they're just they're a little bureaucracy with a building in Belgium, you know, and and so Brussels somewhere. So, at any rate, they they they just announced that they think other countries should do this, right? Release their strategic oil. So that's what they've announced. Again, it's just part of the narrative game, right? And uh so that's the invitation. Believe your own lion eyes. Decide for yourself. Is this war growing or is it tapering off? You know, how long, you know, what are the impacts going to be? And I believe in just sort of like feeling my way through that poll because I can't analyze. This is a complex system. Nobody, if anybody says, "I know what's going to happen." They're not. Well, they're either diluting themselves or they're lying because these are complex systems. You just have to observe what's going to happen. All I know for sure is that when you starve a complex system for feed stocks and energy, you get all sorts of new emergent behaviors on the back end, right? It's just life. So, we're going to have to watch that. We're going to have to watch it very carefully. But, I do believe, Paul, that there's better times coming. I don't think it would be the worst thing if the market took a big old breather and went really far down because I would prefer personally that my kids have an opportunity to buy things that are cheap rather than hideously expensive. So, but that's just me, right? >> Right. And we reset, housing prices come down. You know, I'm not talking about great reset. I'm just talking about resetting to a sustainable long-term normal growth economy without all of the outside influence. But hey, regardless of what's going on in the Middle East, Chris, it's it it's pulling our attention over here. But Poly Market announces yesterday that Americans are taking hardship withdrawals out of their 401k at the largest level ever. >> So if the economy's that Yeah. ever. >> Whoa. >> So uh I'll read the headline here. I'll save you Sharon. Americans are now taking more hardship withdrawals from their 401k retirement accounts than at any time in history. So ever. History was the exact term. Well, on top of that, you've got all kinds of private credit issues. Let's see here. So, this is the Poly Market uh tweet that they put out here. Okay, so let's go over to um Tracy Shukart. Black Rockck slashes another private loan value. So, this was March the 5th from 100 to zero. So, she's she's putting out what what uh Bloomberg did. So, Black Rockck slashed the value of a private loan to Infinite Commerce Holdings to zero just three months after assessing it at 100 cents on the dollar. Okay. So, this loan is worthless. Marks the second sudden wipeout to recently hit Black Rockck's private credit division, highlighting a key fault line in private credit. Now, for those listeners out there that have seen that headline that Black Rockck's going to go bankrupt, this is an this doesn't have to do with Black Rockck itself. This is some of the funds that they investments they have in their funds. So I love what Melody Wright says. I'm losing count gradually than uh suddenly. >> So Black Rockck limits withdrawals as redemptions rattle private credit fund. That's Poly Market. Let's see which one this one is. >> FHA uh mortgage delinquencies continue to rise to 13.7% in January 2026 and they're actually accelerating. So January 2025 was 12.8, 8 January 2024 was uh 12.4 8.2 million homeowners on FHA alone are behind on their loans. 5.23% are over 90 days late. Half are seriously delinquent. So that's increasing. That's not getting better. If the economy was that good, the question is would you know we shouldn't be seeing a lot of that. And then of course on top of this, you know, Mario Newfall puts out Iranian state media, US tech giants in the region are fair targets. So I mean there's just a there's a lot of things that are taking place uh uh behind the surface that are dangerous to this narrative that the market is great and it's priced to perfection. I mean, it really is. is I mean I can go back and show that price to earnings ratio chart in a minute but just to get back to a fairly valued market it's a 50% decline. Okay, just to get back to an overvalued market because we're so extremely overvalued on the S&P 500 is a 30% decline. And assuming earnings hold up if we get to an undervalued market which we saw in the 1970s with the similar problems that we're having right now. Okay, that's a 70% decline. And and and if you think it can't happen, I'm sorry, you're being foolish. We hope it doesn't, and maybe it doesn't. There's forces that could keep it from getting there. But the reality is that's the mathematics of the risk associated with where we find ourselves in the market. So, um, this is a dangerous time. You got to be prudent. maybe we'll just turn Japanese and have the Federal Reserve buy our ETFs, right? So, it's always worth remembering, Paul, that that there are unthinkable things that will probably be thought um when the time comes, right? And it's it's but again, the purpose of a market is to be a price discounting mechanism and also to connect capital and it's supposed to send signals out there, right? So, if there were two banks in town and one of them had to offer me 12% and the other was offering me 4% on a savings account, there's information contained in that, right? H what's the 12% bank doing? Must be pretty risky for them to have to pay up so much to attract capital like that. So again, anytime we take our markets and and they become just um price setting arenas, right, where the Fed decides what the whole yield curve should look like or the Bank of Japan does that or they decide that maybe markets it would be awkward if they felt today so we're going to like do whatever we can to keep them propped up or this is the right price for copper or oil or silver or gold that when they do that they create these distortions, Paul, that ultimately make things over the long haul worse not better, right? So, weirdly enough, we're coming into this whole thing with oil with in the Middle East with the United States having publicly announced a year ago that we're entering peak oil is the twilight of our shale play is now hitting. It's not fantasy anymore. It's not fanfiction from peak oil doomsters. It's from the EIA, the Energy Information Agency in the US. This is reality. I would like our markets to begin to reflect reality because what did Dan Ran say? You know, you can ignore reality, but you can't ignore the consequences of ignoring reality. We're trying to ignore reality here by by pretending as if the narrative, the price narrative is actually the only one that matters. And of course, it does matter, but it's not the only thing that matters. And so, I think, yeah, we have to get back to some sense of reality here at some point, which may come courtesy of China saying, "Oh, here's the reality. We own all the supply chains for all the stuff you need." Like, yeah, we got those, you know, >> right? >> We forgot to build those. >> Yeah. For maximum profitability. >> Yep. All right. Well, you got anything else today or should should we leave it there? >> No, we should leave it there. I'm I'm I I I will say we're very very close to an official long-term sell signal on the S&P and the NASDAQ. Like, it could happen officially at the end of the month if if price action continues the same. Now, that doesn't mean that we're going to wait till the end of the month, you know, but when we're in this position, but typically when that happens, I I will tell people, hey, we're officially on a full defensive stance, and we're we're very close. You get there's times where we've gotten here before and it it goes on for a little bit longer, but our decision points are in place and and uh we'll not hesitate to act as information comes along. And more than likely, that's going to be defensively to protect capital. Well, I'm glad you're there doing that and I'm I'm I'm really glad that you can serve the clients the way you do with the riskmanaged approach. For anybody who might be interested in working with Paul and his team, please go to peakfinancialinvesting.com, fill out a very simple form, and within 48 business hours, somebody's from Paul's team will get back to you to schedule uh the first of three sessions together. an introductory call and then a uh planning call to get through that and then if it progresses from there into a recommendations call and then if that all seems to work I guess at that point you would say oh let's work together if that knits together. So peak financial investing.com with that Paul thank you so much for your time today and um go get some more sun looks good on you. >> Well thank you I'm looking forward to getting some this weekend. So for you and everybody out there, may the Lord grant us all wisdom, insight, and discernment for the days ahead. >> All right, with that, bye everybody. We'll see you next week. I'm sure it'll be an action-packed week. We'll have lots to talk about then, too. All right, bye for now.