The NEW Whale Buying MORE GOLD Than Central Banks!
Summary
Gold: The guest is bullish on gold, citing a fourth consecutive month of gains and momentum driven by rising odds of Fed rate cuts.
Tether’s Impact: Tether emerged as a major gold buyer, purchasing 24 tons in Q3 and holding 116 tons, using Treasury bill interest to fund gold and royalty acquisitions.
Gold Royalties: Positive view on gold royalty companies as Tether channels capital into the space, with potential dividend appeal and spillover benefits to listed royalty names.
Barrick Gold (GOLD): Activist pressure and potential restructuring/split are catalysts, with improving free cash flow outlook aided by higher realized gold prices and a strong balance sheet.
ETF Flows: Asia shows strong gold ETF inflows while Europe sees outflows driven by rebalancing and profit-taking, supporting a demand shift toward the East.
Macro Drivers: Elevated probability of near-term Fed rate cuts is a key tailwind for gold, while US consumer weakness and rising credit card balances pose broader market risks.
Copper: Copper is in an uptrend amid tight opportunities and ongoing M&A discussions involving major miners, offering cyclical upside but requiring deal-watch vigilance.
Geopolitics: Ukraine peace talk speculation and Japan-China tensions are being monitored, with the guest expecting limited near-term impact on gold prices.
Transcript
Gold is looking at the fourth consecutive month of gains. And a massive new player has emerged in the gold space, buying more gold than any central bank in the third quarter. Who that is, we'll discuss later here in this weekly market wrap-up. But if you've been following along on our channel, you probably know who that is already. And with that said, welcome to our Soore Financially weekly market wrap-up. Really appreciate you joining us. I'm back in the studio. It was a busy busy fall. I'm really looking forward to winding down the year and really counting the days to Christmas. But until then, we got lots to discuss. And maybe before we get started, dive into some of the details and some of the things that kept us busy this week, I want to say thank you to all of you who joined us in Frankfurt at the Deutsche Goa. It meant a lot to meet many of our subscribers at the conference and uh it it was probably the best one we've ever hosted. We had phenomenal keynotes. We had a massive massive turnout. Of course, over $4,000 gold helps. Momentum was there, enthusiasm, people were excited. It It was absolutely phenomenal. And uh my my head is still spinning. But uh in in other news, our videos are now live. Uh ju just go over to YouTube, type in Deutsche Goldmas or Deutsche Goldmas, and you can find the presentations from day one are up already. Day two will follow later today here on Friday, November 28th. So make sure to use that. We've got some phenomenal panel discussions. We got Alex Grryer giving his hedge uh his his hedging presentation and many many more uh to to watch here. So go go ahead and do that. Um and uh yeah, as I said, I'm really really appreciative of you all joining us in Frankfurt. So thanks so much for doing that. Now let let's dive into what really moved markets this week. Uh let's take a look at the calendar first because there are a couple things I do want to highlight that we've been presented with um this week. So we got the PPI um I think that's the producer price index as expected within consensus but one thing that wasn't within consensus and that's retail sales. That's something I quickly want to talk about because the consumer sentiment has been has been lacking uh in in the US and it's been coming down. Let's take a look at it in more detail here real quick. As you can see, there is a negative trend. Um, it's not in negative territory or negative growth at all yet, but uh the trend is negative. And those are the September numbers. Keep that in mind, not October um for the consumer sales. And my my assumption is that October was weaker before Christmas period kicks off again. Uh this is especially interesting since uh forecast institutes are looking at a let's share this here real quick. record Christmas sales over a trillion dollar for the first time. This is absolutely crazy. Although I have to admit, I've been, you know, doing a lot of Black Week shopping. There's some insane deals to be had. But, uh, it's it's now Black Week. It used to be Black Friday. Now it's Black Week. And some other some companies have extended the Black Week to Black Month and all of that. Um, so desperation is is high here on the sales side. But, uh, I was looking at this. Okay, so we're getting uh a trillion dollars. We're exceeding it. They're anticipating growth between three and a 3.7 and 4.2% over 2024. And I'm wondering like aren't we supposed to be in a recession? Aren't we are isn't the consumer supposed to be hurting? So I I took a closer look at that and uh I'm struggling with understanding it, but I was looking. So how does the consumer finance this? And then I I looked at this here. Uh, United States credit card accounts, highest level in Q3 that I've ever seen. Let's take a look at the 10-year real quick. Well, it's going higher. I don't think it's just uh consumers signing up for insane uh credit card programs where you get a ton of miles and signup bonuses. I think they're actually using those credit cards to pay for those expenses. And maybe the other one we should look at as well is um debt balance of course uh in credit cards is much higher. And uh if you look at it of course constant trend uh we've seen a bit of a credit card debt being paid down of course during during COVID as the free money rolled in but overall credit card debt is at its highest level in the last 10 years. Is that sustainable? Not in the long term. Not in the long term. So I I really want I really want you to keep that in mind looking at uh consumer sentiment when you hear like okay everything's great. Um it might not be. It might not be. So uh keep keep that in mind. Um be before we talk about uh other market moves here especially out of the US I do want to talk geopolitics for just one second because of course the macro influences the micro. The macro for us is uh you know what's happening in the markets of course but also geopolitically. Let's let's take a look. There are two big topics that sort of dominated headlines this week or over the last seven days. One of course is the peace plan um that was suggested um between Russia and Ukraine here with the US brokering of course um it is interesting it is getting some traction of course a lot of a lot of the points were mentioned or maybe even copied as some source suggest uh from a Russian peace plan but uh Putin breaks his silence on Ukraine peace plan says Moscow is ready for serious talks which is good we we do want peace the question is at what cost and are we going to or is the Ukraine Not we is the Ukraine going to accept certain um uh considerations maybe uh some territory uh needs to be handed over to Russia but the peace plan itself is is interesting but it could have been done two three years ago if we really agree on all of this quite honestly we could have cut the war short by two and a half years or three years if we if we agree to many of the things that are now being proposed like no NATO uh army or military being stationed in in in the Ukraine Ukraine remains and sovereign uh US guarantees for security. Russia says it's not going to evade any of the other European countries, which made me really laugh quite honestly cuz as a pragmatic, and we've discussed this here on this channel with Martin Armstrong and many others, Russia has nothing to gain from invading Europe. We don't have any resources. We don't have any money. Yeah, they might make it to Frankfurt and get our gold, but I'm trying to be funny here, but there is nothing to be gained. So that's why when I saw this headline this morning and let me share this here um that Putin says he's ready to guarantee in writing no Russian attack in Europe. I I have to like I'm not a Putin supporter. I'm not like all in his camp at all, but I do have to laugh about this and he's probably laughing his ass off as well. Pardon my French here, but I'm sorry. Like he was never going to attack Europe and of course he'll give it up to us in writing because he was never planning on doing it anyway. So he must be laughing at the Kremlin. I'm sorry. this is an absolute joke um that we celebrate this, but uh it was a given. So um I'm all for Peace Plan. Um Neil Ferguson, let me see if I can pull up his tweet real quick. I didn't have it prepared, but um Neil Ferguson even made some interesting comments and he he's a good commentator in that space. Let's see if I can find him real quick. Um he posted about this peace plan and I I do agree. um the the cost is is high. Um and he offers a bit of a contrarian view to the latest negotiations, but how many concessions should Ukraine have to make? And let me share this tab real quick so you can see it as well. Um how many concessions should Ukraine have to make to secure an end to the hostilities? And and we have to keep in mind like how is this going to end um without any concessions? it can't become an infinite war. Ukraine cannot afford this. Europe does not really want to step in or actually Europe wants to step in. But what what's the point? Um so he he has some interesting takes on this and uh maybe we should take a look at it as well. Um it it comes down to cost and opportunities I guess opportunity cost and while it's painful to give concessions and I'm way out of my depth here. We we need to find a resolution. I think that's the whole point I want to say. I think there is some movement. Why do we keep an eye on it? because it could have an impact on the gold price of course. Um just coming from this like any any geopolitical uh like peace is great for for gold. Um although like the the peace in the Middle East hasn't really affected gold price. I don't think this will have a big effect either. Maybe $1500 at best. But uh it's mostly driven by other factors and we'll get to those in a second. Um, one other topic that I quickly want to highlight is um is or not highlight, it's not a highlight, but and um it's it's the escalation between China and Japan. Um the Japan, as we all know, has a new prime minister, and she's she's rather aggressive. It was kind of interesting to see her step in the limelight and maybe take taking it up a notch cuz she's been saying pretty much that uh if if China were to invade Taiwan, China would Japan would feel threatened and it would be a problem for their internal security. And I'm trying uh there's a there's one term that she used and um that is something that opened the door to something that could interact or could trigger a military reaction. Let me share this here again. I I keep using Elazer quite a bit and I do apologize for that, but they have some really good articles and I'm trying to find articles from various sources and uh she says if it involves the use of warships military actions, it could by all means become a survival threatening situation for Japan as well and that opens the door uh to some aggression from Japan versus China and and and stepping in there. And aggression is the wrong term probably, but maybe some some retaliation um here. And now China has been escalating this to the UN. Uh there are some trade uh some some trade embargos happening as well. So it's a situation we need to monitor closely. Uh even Trump stepped in and um managers like well Japan tone it down tone it down. We're we're here trying to have a our trade war negotiated here and maybe settled. Um let's calm things down here. So it is um something we need to monitor. So far, I think it's all diplomacy and it's uh it's not supposed to be too hot yet, but it's something we need to keep an eye on. Uh because China does feel threatened by the words from Japan, although I don't see Japan being proactive here, more retaliatory, but Japan keeps the option open of of attacking Taiwan. So, it is something we need to monitor. So, that said, I already used the first 10 minutes just to talk geopolitics. Uh let's talk to let's talk about what is really moving the gold price in my opinion. Um, and that is the Fed. I have to say, I I can't shake that feeling. Uh, we've had some interesting commentary from Chris Waller and many other Fed governors this week advocating for a December rate cut. And since that was was made public, gold has taken off. It's rallied another $100. Let's take a look at the gold price as we speak here real quick so we're all on the same page. And um, gold is trading at 4173 as we speak. Uh, it has accelerated. Let's take a look at the one month here real quick. So just just as of last Friday when those comments were made, gold is up from uh 40 4036 just barely above 4,000 now closer to 4200 again. Uh really accelerating in momentum. What was said? Well, let me show you something real quick and uh I had that prepared right here. Let's share this and let's hit play. But the labor market is still weak and not we're getting no evidence telling me it's rebounding any despite what the jobs report for September said. So my concern is mainly the labor market in terms of our dual mandate. So I'm advocating for a rate cut at the next meeting. >> And this is Fed Governor Chris Waller. He's one of the three candidates that President Trump wants to put potentially put uh or nominate for chair of the Fed. Uh so that's really interesting because he was fairly neutral at the last meeting and Stephen Marin as we all remember uh was the aggressive one and he sort of backpedled a little bit and now he's now he's out there saying again well we need another cut and that's really kicked things off as uh he his his voice carries quite a bit of weight. Um so let's take a look at the September jobs report real quick that he's mentioned and I have a couple questions about it in general like about the unemployment. Why are we so concerned about the unemployment number? Yes, the trend is terrible. 4.4% unemployment rate and this is for September. Keep keep in mind because of the US government shutdown. This report was sent to us or delivered to us 6 weeks late. So of course this is not accurate data. Uh keep keep that in mind. Um the non-farm payroll employment edged up in September. Okay, that was a bit against what we had expected. But the unemployment rate went up to 4.4%. It said it changed a little. Well, it ticked up.1%. Yes. Uh overall that is little. Um employment continue to trend up in healthcare, food service and drinking places. That's kind of interesting definition. And social assistance great. Uh job losses occur in transportation and warehousing and in federal government. No surprise there really. Uh let's let's um take a look though and one thing I do want to show uh that I need to understand a little bit. I'm really trying to understand like yes the underlying trend of course is negative on the jobless rate. Let's take a look at this chart here real quick uh by trading economics. So this is the last year 4.4%. Yes, it is the highest in the last 12 months. But if you look at the last three years, we're barely higher than where we were last September. Look look at it like 4.1. Now we're at 4.4. It's a.3% higher. So where where's that urgency coming from of other Fed cuts? I'm starting to think and it's starting to creep in and uh please comment down below if you think very differently, but it's starting to feel like an excuse to lower rates. Um 4.3 4.4% really really let's let's zoom out 10 years ago. Okay. Where were we in 2016? 4.8 4.9% 5.1%. I think we're still within uh within uh the the typical range. I I would be concerned if it were 7% of course. Uh maybe it's I don't know. Maybe they're seeing something that I'm not seeing, but uh it's not going to be 7% tomorrow. Um maybe if the stock market collapses, maybe. But come on, let's let's be real. Let's be realistic here, right? Um so it's trending higher. We had let's take a look at the Fed watch as well. Uh what what's the rate cut on it right now? 84.7% as you can see for December rate cut. And it is forecasted that we'll see three more rate cuts in 2026. So market of course is euphoric as we all know. Let's take a look at the S&P 500. um doing quite well. Let's see year to date. Uh it's trending it's trading near all-time highs yet again. The alltime high was 6902. So we're still 70 bucks below or 70 points below alltime highs here in the S&P 500. But we're we're getting there again. We're getting close, right? So all right, let's talk gold because as I said, the Fed is influencing gold prices and uh let's take a look at gold again here just real quick. So last Friday, all right, this is when it would jump from 30% rate cut chance in December to now uh 85%. This is now being priced in. Is this the end of it? It really depends on the comments of course, but we got another what is it 12 days until the Fed meeting. So this could uh trend a little higher. I think we're out of that consolidation phase and we'll see if we can get above 4197 again here in the coming days uh to see if we get make it back up to 4,400. Um again, I'm not a chart technician. There are way better experts out there to explain chart and Fibonacci extensions and Elliot wave and all that good stuff. Whatever you subscribe to, right? Absolutely. Um, but one thing I do want to talk about and I mentioned in my intro, there's a new player in the in the market and uh that new player is making waves. It is a stable coin operator. It is Tether and uh they have been buying gold like there is no tomorrow. They are the largest or they have been the largest gold buyer in Q3 bigger or bought more gold than any central bank. Uh 24 tons in in Q3 alone. Uh that's more than Kazakhstan, Brazil, Turkey, uh in in that's than the central banks here. But uh what what's the goal? What what are they doing? Like how much gold does Tether actually own? So they own 116 tons of gold. That's more than 14 billion. Let's take a quick look uh at at the reserves here. This is from their October report uh from from Tether. And the company holds gold and Bitcoin reserves at 12.9 billion and $9.9 billion. Bitcoin is going trending down. gold is trending higher. Um it's being increased and uh let's take a look at this report that's been put out uh as well. You you can see um of course the stable coins that Tether's been issuing are mostly backed by US Treasury bills, $12 billion. Um some money market funds, some cash as well of course, but the interesting part is the stable coins that are being backed by the US Treasury bills. Tether is banking the interest that's being paid on those bills. And that's what they're using. And that money they're using to buy precious metals. They're buying bitcoins, but mostly precious metals. And if you recall, if you watched this episode before, watched the weekly wrap-up before, they have been buying into royalty companies. Why? Because they might actually be paying a dividend at some point. And there I've interviewed Adrien Day yesterday. This interview, the interview with him will drop on Sunday. Go check that out because we talked quite a bit about Tether's plans in the royalty space and the gold royalty space in particular. And uh it's it's eye opening could be quite interesting and interesting a lucrative opportunity for us investors in that space as well. And we do own a couple positions um within the fund uh the Kamavest or the Kamaxus resource fund that could be benefiting from this as well. Maybe um we own some elemental royalty now which is now listed in the US. We also own um some gold royalty which recently saw investment from Tether as well. So um there's there's some opportunity for us. Um coming back, ETF flows uh are actually tethers. Um I see them increasing by the way. Uh they're positioned further as they're reaping in more and more interest payments from their US Treasury bill holdings and they're using that money. They're also buying farmland by the way. They're not just buying gold, they're buying farmland. As I said, Bitcoin as well. Uh but gold of course has been a big focus as of late. 116 tons. That is a tremendous amount of gold and it's something we should be watching. So they could be making a big splash. And it is interesting how that and I wouldn't call it the crypto world maybe the new h the the new what do you call it the new instrument world um coming back to the real assets coming back to gold so uh interesting really interesting move uh one other thing I want to talk to you about is of course ETF flows and I love looking at the gold ETFs here this is from the world gold council for October 2025 that was published earlier in November and a couple things I do want to highlight and it's absolutely puzzling But as you can see here in this chart one, North America and Asia offset European outflows. Like why is Europe selling gold? Germany had its biggest month of out or second biggest month of outflows in October. It's apparently it's systemic portfolio rebalancing and uh taking gains off the table. Um at uh here driven driven by a combination of profit taking and systemic portfolio rebalancing. Systemic repo. I thought we're at the brink of a financial monetary financial collapse. Like why are we systematically rebalancing our portfolio away from gold? I I don't get it. Like what what is happening Europe um Germany had its second largest monthly outflow as the ETFs? Really, why what are we doing? Um so let's take a look ETF holdings uh and flows by region. Well, Asia has been the biggest buyer, 13.4%. Um there's a really cool um overview as well because it shows the funds um that have been buying of course um by country is also really interesting. South Korea bought uh 39.7% more but China here uh bought 33.8 more tons. So that's up 17.5%. But uh the fund flows top 10 fund flows right here is really interesting u because where are they from? Well the US okay great maybe let's let's go by here. So the biggest E10 top 10 fund flows China, China, China, China 19%, 17%, 16%, 13%. And uh down here, Sprat physical gold trust, let's say Canada 2.5% or US um SPDR gold shares. Okay, the sad part here is um biggest outflows UK sort of Europe, Italy, Germany, Germany, UK, UK, UK, Switzerland, Germany, UK. It's like come on, really? Are we really rebalancing? Curious what that means. Why not? So, um something to something to watch, something to monitor, but uh Asia is still buying aggressively gold and we're seeing that more and more. Uh stimulus packages like Japan is stimulating the economy. China is starting to stimulate the property market. So, there's more money coming back. Uh something we definitely have to keep an eye on. So, um so we talked gold. Let's uh I don't have much prepared for silver quite honestly. Go watch the interview with Gary Savage. Uh he he's predicting some interesting stuff for silver. High much higher prices of course, but uh something or I've heard that a few times this week. Silver is is apparently the trade. So go check out that interview with Gary Savage. It's absolutely worth your while. Um let's see what else. What else? We talked about this. Let's talk about companies a little bit. Let's talk about um I've prepared two articles here that we need to share. Bareric is under pressure to restructure or split. Um, activist Elliot's taken a stake. Of course, the CEO has left. We talked about this at length because he left the same day Tom Palmer left. Uh, Newmont. So, that was really coincidental. Gold was at $3,800 that day and both CEOs of Bareric, Mark Bristo and John Tom Palmer left. But there there's still um they're still disorganized at at Bareric. I there's now root talks about restructuring or maybe splitting up the company, focusing more on Nevada, maybe even selling Rico in in in in Pakistan. Wonder who could be that buyer cuz the risk profile of course is painful. Uh constantly articles coming out about terror attacks in Baluchistan there. Not sure why you'd want to be there. Um besides it is an economically lucrative project, but does it really fit the barrack profile? And on the other end like Mali uh as we all know had barricad some massive issues in Mali with one of their gold mines. Four of their staff members were uh imprisoned and uh this seems to be getting resolved as well. Let's take a look at the the p the share price of Bareric real quick and it's looking fantastic. We had a bit of a dip because there was uncertainty. Um there was uncertainty uh following Bristol's exit. But now looking at the cash, the barric has a net cash position. Uh free cash flow is at a record level. And uh I maybe I forgot to mention it when we talked about the gold price, but Q4 gold prices, average gold prices over $4,000 right now. That should print massive free cash flows for the miners. Uh last last quarter, Barry Newman, for example, reported uh achieved price per ounce sold was 3539 uh per per ounce. We're trading over $4,000 gold. Right now, the margin expansion is increasing. Yes, costs are increasing a little bit. We talked about Egu having to pay higher royalties, for example. But come on, the $500 more per ounce staggering. And I think that's what we're seeing is being priced in now. Um the activity by Elliot is being po seen positive as well by the market. A split up maybe getting rid of Rico or splitting spinning it off into a separate entity might make sense and the market is uh really celebrating that. So really really good stuff. Um and one other article we haven't talked about copper yet today. Um I don't have let's take a look at the copper price real quick. Um let's take a look real quick. Copper is fighting its way back. We had the tariff news here, but uh I said it before, copper is now in an uptrend, 518 per pound. So copper is still very much sought after. We don't have to go into the supply and demand uh story here. But one thing we do need to talk about is the the Anglo tech merger uh which is still not finalized and BHP was looking at be maybe jumping in there as an interloper and offer talking to Anglo again, but they walked away. Um, it is interesting because BHP, of course, the world's largest mining company, seemingly made a fresh attempt to buy the smaller rival, meaning Anglo, but then walked away just a couple days later. We don't really know what they saw or they didn't see or whether Anglo was just being um ridiculous in terms of what they were asking for perhaps, but that's speculation on my part. But um it looks like the only interloper that we could expect now to to break up the Anglo tech merger could be Glenor. they will have to sign off because they do have a joint venture with tech down in Peru. I'm not if I'm not mistaken, maybe Chile, but um they could jump in and maybe buy out tech straight up. That would look make things a little more complicated, but to be honest, I'm not seeing it. I Googled for headlines or anything any rumors. There isn't much. So, um or there isn't anything to be found. So, it's something we need to keep an eye on because, uh copper is is is highly in demand. Would BHP buy a Rico Dick? I I doubt it personally. I I don't know enough about that, but uh the opportunities are getting very very rare out there. So maybe the desperation calls for a desperate move. So it'll be interesting to see what what's going to happen here. Um that's all I have prepared for this week. Uh already 26 minutes in, but uh really appreciate you watching. If you have any questions, uh let me know. It has been an interesting week. Of course, we're watching on a regular basis what is happening. I do have one last trip lined up. I'm headed to London uh for for a conference and a ton of meetings with uh companies uh next week, Monday through Wednesday. But uh I promise we'll continue turnurning out phenomenal content with phenomenal guests. I know who's coming. Judy Shelton, Professor Jang is coming back next week as well. Really looking forward to catching up with him again about what is happening uh in in in China. Perfect guest to talk about the relationship between China and Japan right now as well. So if you haven't done so, quick reminder, hit that like and subscribe button. means a lot to us. And I hope you enjoyed this weekly wrap-up. If you did, leave a like. Thank you so much. We'll be back with more. Take care.
The NEW Whale Buying MORE GOLD Than Central Banks!
Summary
Transcript
Gold is looking at the fourth consecutive month of gains. And a massive new player has emerged in the gold space, buying more gold than any central bank in the third quarter. Who that is, we'll discuss later here in this weekly market wrap-up. But if you've been following along on our channel, you probably know who that is already. And with that said, welcome to our Soore Financially weekly market wrap-up. Really appreciate you joining us. I'm back in the studio. It was a busy busy fall. I'm really looking forward to winding down the year and really counting the days to Christmas. But until then, we got lots to discuss. And maybe before we get started, dive into some of the details and some of the things that kept us busy this week, I want to say thank you to all of you who joined us in Frankfurt at the Deutsche Goa. It meant a lot to meet many of our subscribers at the conference and uh it it was probably the best one we've ever hosted. We had phenomenal keynotes. We had a massive massive turnout. Of course, over $4,000 gold helps. Momentum was there, enthusiasm, people were excited. It It was absolutely phenomenal. And uh my my head is still spinning. But uh in in other news, our videos are now live. Uh ju just go over to YouTube, type in Deutsche Goldmas or Deutsche Goldmas, and you can find the presentations from day one are up already. Day two will follow later today here on Friday, November 28th. So make sure to use that. We've got some phenomenal panel discussions. We got Alex Grryer giving his hedge uh his his hedging presentation and many many more uh to to watch here. So go go ahead and do that. Um and uh yeah, as I said, I'm really really appreciative of you all joining us in Frankfurt. So thanks so much for doing that. Now let let's dive into what really moved markets this week. Uh let's take a look at the calendar first because there are a couple things I do want to highlight that we've been presented with um this week. So we got the PPI um I think that's the producer price index as expected within consensus but one thing that wasn't within consensus and that's retail sales. That's something I quickly want to talk about because the consumer sentiment has been has been lacking uh in in the US and it's been coming down. Let's take a look at it in more detail here real quick. As you can see, there is a negative trend. Um, it's not in negative territory or negative growth at all yet, but uh the trend is negative. And those are the September numbers. Keep that in mind, not October um for the consumer sales. And my my assumption is that October was weaker before Christmas period kicks off again. Uh this is especially interesting since uh forecast institutes are looking at a let's share this here real quick. record Christmas sales over a trillion dollar for the first time. This is absolutely crazy. Although I have to admit, I've been, you know, doing a lot of Black Week shopping. There's some insane deals to be had. But, uh, it's it's now Black Week. It used to be Black Friday. Now it's Black Week. And some other some companies have extended the Black Week to Black Month and all of that. Um, so desperation is is high here on the sales side. But, uh, I was looking at this. Okay, so we're getting uh a trillion dollars. We're exceeding it. They're anticipating growth between three and a 3.7 and 4.2% over 2024. And I'm wondering like aren't we supposed to be in a recession? Aren't we are isn't the consumer supposed to be hurting? So I I took a closer look at that and uh I'm struggling with understanding it, but I was looking. So how does the consumer finance this? And then I I looked at this here. Uh, United States credit card accounts, highest level in Q3 that I've ever seen. Let's take a look at the 10-year real quick. Well, it's going higher. I don't think it's just uh consumers signing up for insane uh credit card programs where you get a ton of miles and signup bonuses. I think they're actually using those credit cards to pay for those expenses. And maybe the other one we should look at as well is um debt balance of course uh in credit cards is much higher. And uh if you look at it of course constant trend uh we've seen a bit of a credit card debt being paid down of course during during COVID as the free money rolled in but overall credit card debt is at its highest level in the last 10 years. Is that sustainable? Not in the long term. Not in the long term. So I I really want I really want you to keep that in mind looking at uh consumer sentiment when you hear like okay everything's great. Um it might not be. It might not be. So uh keep keep that in mind. Um be before we talk about uh other market moves here especially out of the US I do want to talk geopolitics for just one second because of course the macro influences the micro. The macro for us is uh you know what's happening in the markets of course but also geopolitically. Let's let's take a look. There are two big topics that sort of dominated headlines this week or over the last seven days. One of course is the peace plan um that was suggested um between Russia and Ukraine here with the US brokering of course um it is interesting it is getting some traction of course a lot of a lot of the points were mentioned or maybe even copied as some source suggest uh from a Russian peace plan but uh Putin breaks his silence on Ukraine peace plan says Moscow is ready for serious talks which is good we we do want peace the question is at what cost and are we going to or is the Ukraine Not we is the Ukraine going to accept certain um uh considerations maybe uh some territory uh needs to be handed over to Russia but the peace plan itself is is interesting but it could have been done two three years ago if we really agree on all of this quite honestly we could have cut the war short by two and a half years or three years if we if we agree to many of the things that are now being proposed like no NATO uh army or military being stationed in in in the Ukraine Ukraine remains and sovereign uh US guarantees for security. Russia says it's not going to evade any of the other European countries, which made me really laugh quite honestly cuz as a pragmatic, and we've discussed this here on this channel with Martin Armstrong and many others, Russia has nothing to gain from invading Europe. We don't have any resources. We don't have any money. Yeah, they might make it to Frankfurt and get our gold, but I'm trying to be funny here, but there is nothing to be gained. So that's why when I saw this headline this morning and let me share this here um that Putin says he's ready to guarantee in writing no Russian attack in Europe. I I have to like I'm not a Putin supporter. I'm not like all in his camp at all, but I do have to laugh about this and he's probably laughing his ass off as well. Pardon my French here, but I'm sorry. Like he was never going to attack Europe and of course he'll give it up to us in writing because he was never planning on doing it anyway. So he must be laughing at the Kremlin. I'm sorry. this is an absolute joke um that we celebrate this, but uh it was a given. So um I'm all for Peace Plan. Um Neil Ferguson, let me see if I can pull up his tweet real quick. I didn't have it prepared, but um Neil Ferguson even made some interesting comments and he he's a good commentator in that space. Let's see if I can find him real quick. Um he posted about this peace plan and I I do agree. um the the cost is is high. Um and he offers a bit of a contrarian view to the latest negotiations, but how many concessions should Ukraine have to make? And let me share this tab real quick so you can see it as well. Um how many concessions should Ukraine have to make to secure an end to the hostilities? And and we have to keep in mind like how is this going to end um without any concessions? it can't become an infinite war. Ukraine cannot afford this. Europe does not really want to step in or actually Europe wants to step in. But what what's the point? Um so he he has some interesting takes on this and uh maybe we should take a look at it as well. Um it it comes down to cost and opportunities I guess opportunity cost and while it's painful to give concessions and I'm way out of my depth here. We we need to find a resolution. I think that's the whole point I want to say. I think there is some movement. Why do we keep an eye on it? because it could have an impact on the gold price of course. Um just coming from this like any any geopolitical uh like peace is great for for gold. Um although like the the peace in the Middle East hasn't really affected gold price. I don't think this will have a big effect either. Maybe $1500 at best. But uh it's mostly driven by other factors and we'll get to those in a second. Um, one other topic that I quickly want to highlight is um is or not highlight, it's not a highlight, but and um it's it's the escalation between China and Japan. Um the Japan, as we all know, has a new prime minister, and she's she's rather aggressive. It was kind of interesting to see her step in the limelight and maybe take taking it up a notch cuz she's been saying pretty much that uh if if China were to invade Taiwan, China would Japan would feel threatened and it would be a problem for their internal security. And I'm trying uh there's a there's one term that she used and um that is something that opened the door to something that could interact or could trigger a military reaction. Let me share this here again. I I keep using Elazer quite a bit and I do apologize for that, but they have some really good articles and I'm trying to find articles from various sources and uh she says if it involves the use of warships military actions, it could by all means become a survival threatening situation for Japan as well and that opens the door uh to some aggression from Japan versus China and and and stepping in there. And aggression is the wrong term probably, but maybe some some retaliation um here. And now China has been escalating this to the UN. Uh there are some trade uh some some trade embargos happening as well. So it's a situation we need to monitor closely. Uh even Trump stepped in and um managers like well Japan tone it down tone it down. We're we're here trying to have a our trade war negotiated here and maybe settled. Um let's calm things down here. So it is um something we need to monitor. So far, I think it's all diplomacy and it's uh it's not supposed to be too hot yet, but it's something we need to keep an eye on. Uh because China does feel threatened by the words from Japan, although I don't see Japan being proactive here, more retaliatory, but Japan keeps the option open of of attacking Taiwan. So, it is something we need to monitor. So, that said, I already used the first 10 minutes just to talk geopolitics. Uh let's talk to let's talk about what is really moving the gold price in my opinion. Um, and that is the Fed. I have to say, I I can't shake that feeling. Uh, we've had some interesting commentary from Chris Waller and many other Fed governors this week advocating for a December rate cut. And since that was was made public, gold has taken off. It's rallied another $100. Let's take a look at the gold price as we speak here real quick so we're all on the same page. And um, gold is trading at 4173 as we speak. Uh, it has accelerated. Let's take a look at the one month here real quick. So just just as of last Friday when those comments were made, gold is up from uh 40 4036 just barely above 4,000 now closer to 4200 again. Uh really accelerating in momentum. What was said? Well, let me show you something real quick and uh I had that prepared right here. Let's share this and let's hit play. But the labor market is still weak and not we're getting no evidence telling me it's rebounding any despite what the jobs report for September said. So my concern is mainly the labor market in terms of our dual mandate. So I'm advocating for a rate cut at the next meeting. >> And this is Fed Governor Chris Waller. He's one of the three candidates that President Trump wants to put potentially put uh or nominate for chair of the Fed. Uh so that's really interesting because he was fairly neutral at the last meeting and Stephen Marin as we all remember uh was the aggressive one and he sort of backpedled a little bit and now he's now he's out there saying again well we need another cut and that's really kicked things off as uh he his his voice carries quite a bit of weight. Um so let's take a look at the September jobs report real quick that he's mentioned and I have a couple questions about it in general like about the unemployment. Why are we so concerned about the unemployment number? Yes, the trend is terrible. 4.4% unemployment rate and this is for September. Keep keep in mind because of the US government shutdown. This report was sent to us or delivered to us 6 weeks late. So of course this is not accurate data. Uh keep keep that in mind. Um the non-farm payroll employment edged up in September. Okay, that was a bit against what we had expected. But the unemployment rate went up to 4.4%. It said it changed a little. Well, it ticked up.1%. Yes. Uh overall that is little. Um employment continue to trend up in healthcare, food service and drinking places. That's kind of interesting definition. And social assistance great. Uh job losses occur in transportation and warehousing and in federal government. No surprise there really. Uh let's let's um take a look though and one thing I do want to show uh that I need to understand a little bit. I'm really trying to understand like yes the underlying trend of course is negative on the jobless rate. Let's take a look at this chart here real quick uh by trading economics. So this is the last year 4.4%. Yes, it is the highest in the last 12 months. But if you look at the last three years, we're barely higher than where we were last September. Look look at it like 4.1. Now we're at 4.4. It's a.3% higher. So where where's that urgency coming from of other Fed cuts? I'm starting to think and it's starting to creep in and uh please comment down below if you think very differently, but it's starting to feel like an excuse to lower rates. Um 4.3 4.4% really really let's let's zoom out 10 years ago. Okay. Where were we in 2016? 4.8 4.9% 5.1%. I think we're still within uh within uh the the typical range. I I would be concerned if it were 7% of course. Uh maybe it's I don't know. Maybe they're seeing something that I'm not seeing, but uh it's not going to be 7% tomorrow. Um maybe if the stock market collapses, maybe. But come on, let's let's be real. Let's be realistic here, right? Um so it's trending higher. We had let's take a look at the Fed watch as well. Uh what what's the rate cut on it right now? 84.7% as you can see for December rate cut. And it is forecasted that we'll see three more rate cuts in 2026. So market of course is euphoric as we all know. Let's take a look at the S&P 500. um doing quite well. Let's see year to date. Uh it's trending it's trading near all-time highs yet again. The alltime high was 6902. So we're still 70 bucks below or 70 points below alltime highs here in the S&P 500. But we're we're getting there again. We're getting close, right? So all right, let's talk gold because as I said, the Fed is influencing gold prices and uh let's take a look at gold again here just real quick. So last Friday, all right, this is when it would jump from 30% rate cut chance in December to now uh 85%. This is now being priced in. Is this the end of it? It really depends on the comments of course, but we got another what is it 12 days until the Fed meeting. So this could uh trend a little higher. I think we're out of that consolidation phase and we'll see if we can get above 4197 again here in the coming days uh to see if we get make it back up to 4,400. Um again, I'm not a chart technician. There are way better experts out there to explain chart and Fibonacci extensions and Elliot wave and all that good stuff. Whatever you subscribe to, right? Absolutely. Um, but one thing I do want to talk about and I mentioned in my intro, there's a new player in the in the market and uh that new player is making waves. It is a stable coin operator. It is Tether and uh they have been buying gold like there is no tomorrow. They are the largest or they have been the largest gold buyer in Q3 bigger or bought more gold than any central bank. Uh 24 tons in in Q3 alone. Uh that's more than Kazakhstan, Brazil, Turkey, uh in in that's than the central banks here. But uh what what's the goal? What what are they doing? Like how much gold does Tether actually own? So they own 116 tons of gold. That's more than 14 billion. Let's take a quick look uh at at the reserves here. This is from their October report uh from from Tether. And the company holds gold and Bitcoin reserves at 12.9 billion and $9.9 billion. Bitcoin is going trending down. gold is trending higher. Um it's being increased and uh let's take a look at this report that's been put out uh as well. You you can see um of course the stable coins that Tether's been issuing are mostly backed by US Treasury bills, $12 billion. Um some money market funds, some cash as well of course, but the interesting part is the stable coins that are being backed by the US Treasury bills. Tether is banking the interest that's being paid on those bills. And that's what they're using. And that money they're using to buy precious metals. They're buying bitcoins, but mostly precious metals. And if you recall, if you watched this episode before, watched the weekly wrap-up before, they have been buying into royalty companies. Why? Because they might actually be paying a dividend at some point. And there I've interviewed Adrien Day yesterday. This interview, the interview with him will drop on Sunday. Go check that out because we talked quite a bit about Tether's plans in the royalty space and the gold royalty space in particular. And uh it's it's eye opening could be quite interesting and interesting a lucrative opportunity for us investors in that space as well. And we do own a couple positions um within the fund uh the Kamavest or the Kamaxus resource fund that could be benefiting from this as well. Maybe um we own some elemental royalty now which is now listed in the US. We also own um some gold royalty which recently saw investment from Tether as well. So um there's there's some opportunity for us. Um coming back, ETF flows uh are actually tethers. Um I see them increasing by the way. Uh they're positioned further as they're reaping in more and more interest payments from their US Treasury bill holdings and they're using that money. They're also buying farmland by the way. They're not just buying gold, they're buying farmland. As I said, Bitcoin as well. Uh but gold of course has been a big focus as of late. 116 tons. That is a tremendous amount of gold and it's something we should be watching. So they could be making a big splash. And it is interesting how that and I wouldn't call it the crypto world maybe the new h the the new what do you call it the new instrument world um coming back to the real assets coming back to gold so uh interesting really interesting move uh one other thing I want to talk to you about is of course ETF flows and I love looking at the gold ETFs here this is from the world gold council for October 2025 that was published earlier in November and a couple things I do want to highlight and it's absolutely puzzling But as you can see here in this chart one, North America and Asia offset European outflows. Like why is Europe selling gold? Germany had its biggest month of out or second biggest month of outflows in October. It's apparently it's systemic portfolio rebalancing and uh taking gains off the table. Um at uh here driven driven by a combination of profit taking and systemic portfolio rebalancing. Systemic repo. I thought we're at the brink of a financial monetary financial collapse. Like why are we systematically rebalancing our portfolio away from gold? I I don't get it. Like what what is happening Europe um Germany had its second largest monthly outflow as the ETFs? Really, why what are we doing? Um so let's take a look ETF holdings uh and flows by region. Well, Asia has been the biggest buyer, 13.4%. Um there's a really cool um overview as well because it shows the funds um that have been buying of course um by country is also really interesting. South Korea bought uh 39.7% more but China here uh bought 33.8 more tons. So that's up 17.5%. But uh the fund flows top 10 fund flows right here is really interesting u because where are they from? Well the US okay great maybe let's let's go by here. So the biggest E10 top 10 fund flows China, China, China, China 19%, 17%, 16%, 13%. And uh down here, Sprat physical gold trust, let's say Canada 2.5% or US um SPDR gold shares. Okay, the sad part here is um biggest outflows UK sort of Europe, Italy, Germany, Germany, UK, UK, UK, Switzerland, Germany, UK. It's like come on, really? Are we really rebalancing? Curious what that means. Why not? So, um something to something to watch, something to monitor, but uh Asia is still buying aggressively gold and we're seeing that more and more. Uh stimulus packages like Japan is stimulating the economy. China is starting to stimulate the property market. So, there's more money coming back. Uh something we definitely have to keep an eye on. So, um so we talked gold. Let's uh I don't have much prepared for silver quite honestly. Go watch the interview with Gary Savage. Uh he he's predicting some interesting stuff for silver. High much higher prices of course, but uh something or I've heard that a few times this week. Silver is is apparently the trade. So go check out that interview with Gary Savage. It's absolutely worth your while. Um let's see what else. What else? We talked about this. Let's talk about companies a little bit. Let's talk about um I've prepared two articles here that we need to share. Bareric is under pressure to restructure or split. Um, activist Elliot's taken a stake. Of course, the CEO has left. We talked about this at length because he left the same day Tom Palmer left. Uh, Newmont. So, that was really coincidental. Gold was at $3,800 that day and both CEOs of Bareric, Mark Bristo and John Tom Palmer left. But there there's still um they're still disorganized at at Bareric. I there's now root talks about restructuring or maybe splitting up the company, focusing more on Nevada, maybe even selling Rico in in in in Pakistan. Wonder who could be that buyer cuz the risk profile of course is painful. Uh constantly articles coming out about terror attacks in Baluchistan there. Not sure why you'd want to be there. Um besides it is an economically lucrative project, but does it really fit the barrack profile? And on the other end like Mali uh as we all know had barricad some massive issues in Mali with one of their gold mines. Four of their staff members were uh imprisoned and uh this seems to be getting resolved as well. Let's take a look at the the p the share price of Bareric real quick and it's looking fantastic. We had a bit of a dip because there was uncertainty. Um there was uncertainty uh following Bristol's exit. But now looking at the cash, the barric has a net cash position. Uh free cash flow is at a record level. And uh I maybe I forgot to mention it when we talked about the gold price, but Q4 gold prices, average gold prices over $4,000 right now. That should print massive free cash flows for the miners. Uh last last quarter, Barry Newman, for example, reported uh achieved price per ounce sold was 3539 uh per per ounce. We're trading over $4,000 gold. Right now, the margin expansion is increasing. Yes, costs are increasing a little bit. We talked about Egu having to pay higher royalties, for example. But come on, the $500 more per ounce staggering. And I think that's what we're seeing is being priced in now. Um the activity by Elliot is being po seen positive as well by the market. A split up maybe getting rid of Rico or splitting spinning it off into a separate entity might make sense and the market is uh really celebrating that. So really really good stuff. Um and one other article we haven't talked about copper yet today. Um I don't have let's take a look at the copper price real quick. Um let's take a look real quick. Copper is fighting its way back. We had the tariff news here, but uh I said it before, copper is now in an uptrend, 518 per pound. So copper is still very much sought after. We don't have to go into the supply and demand uh story here. But one thing we do need to talk about is the the Anglo tech merger uh which is still not finalized and BHP was looking at be maybe jumping in there as an interloper and offer talking to Anglo again, but they walked away. Um, it is interesting because BHP, of course, the world's largest mining company, seemingly made a fresh attempt to buy the smaller rival, meaning Anglo, but then walked away just a couple days later. We don't really know what they saw or they didn't see or whether Anglo was just being um ridiculous in terms of what they were asking for perhaps, but that's speculation on my part. But um it looks like the only interloper that we could expect now to to break up the Anglo tech merger could be Glenor. they will have to sign off because they do have a joint venture with tech down in Peru. I'm not if I'm not mistaken, maybe Chile, but um they could jump in and maybe buy out tech straight up. That would look make things a little more complicated, but to be honest, I'm not seeing it. I Googled for headlines or anything any rumors. There isn't much. So, um or there isn't anything to be found. So, it's something we need to keep an eye on because, uh copper is is is highly in demand. Would BHP buy a Rico Dick? I I doubt it personally. I I don't know enough about that, but uh the opportunities are getting very very rare out there. So maybe the desperation calls for a desperate move. So it'll be interesting to see what what's going to happen here. Um that's all I have prepared for this week. Uh already 26 minutes in, but uh really appreciate you watching. If you have any questions, uh let me know. It has been an interesting week. Of course, we're watching on a regular basis what is happening. I do have one last trip lined up. I'm headed to London uh for for a conference and a ton of meetings with uh companies uh next week, Monday through Wednesday. But uh I promise we'll continue turnurning out phenomenal content with phenomenal guests. I know who's coming. Judy Shelton, Professor Jang is coming back next week as well. Really looking forward to catching up with him again about what is happening uh in in in China. Perfect guest to talk about the relationship between China and Japan right now as well. So if you haven't done so, quick reminder, hit that like and subscribe button. means a lot to us. And I hope you enjoyed this weekly wrap-up. If you did, leave a like. Thank you so much. We'll be back with more. Take care.