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Economics & Investing For Preppers

Here are the latest news items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. Most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor, JWR [1]. Today, we look at stocking up on magazines, as a legislation hedge. (See the Tangibles Investing section.)

Precious Metals:

Reported back on July 14th: Gold hammered, analysts warn of capitulation event if price drops below pre-pandemic levels [2].

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Copper/gold ratio shows Fed monetary policy is too tight – MKS PAMP [3].

Economy & Finance:

At Zero Hedge: Container Shipping Spot Rates Still Falling: What Will Be The New Normal? [4]

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Paul Craig Roberts: The United States Does Not Have an Economy [5].

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‘The worst bear market in my lifetime’: Here’s why Jim Rogers thinks stocks will decline for a long time — but he also suggests 2 shockproof assets for protection [6].

Commodities:

As reported by Reuters: Commodity swings could pose ‘outsize’ hit to economy, says G20 watchdog [7].

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Gazprom Declares Force Majeure, Will Halt Gas Flows To Germany Indefinitely [8].

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July brings fireworks to corn market [9].

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Over at OilPrice News: Baker Hughes: Oil Market Faces“Unusual Set of Circumstances” [10].

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Der SpiegelLooming Natural Gas Shortages Has the EU Scrambling for Solutions [11].

Derivatives:

The latest OTC derivatives statistics [12], from the BIS. A couple of quotes from the report:

“The notional value of outstanding derivatives contracts fell modestly between end-
June and end-December 2021, from $610 trillion to $600 trillion

and,

The gross market value of derivatives contracts – a measure of amounts at risk –
stood at $12.4 trillion at end-2021, slightly below its end-June 2021 level…

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Jones Day: Derivatives Markets Under Sanction and Pandemic Pressure: How to Respond [13]. An excerpt from their report’s intro:

The Situation: The sanctions placed on Russia, a major exporter of commodities, as well as Russia’s own blockade of Ukrainian exports, such as wheat, have caused a significant knock-on effect in the commodities markets, creating extreme volatility through supply shortages and large price spikes. This is on top of commodities supply chain disruptions caused by the global pandemic.

The Result: The sanctions and following blockade have also led to significant decreases in liquidity, a days-long commodities exchange shutdown, and large variation margin calls, leaving market participants scrambling for financing. These effects will likely lead to heightened scrutiny by regulatory agencies and the possibility of regulatory reform and increased law enforcement activity.”

Forex & Cryptos:

Sterling shrugs off UK inflation surge [14].

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Dollar rises vs euro as traders eye ECB rate decision [15].

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Brandon Smith: Central Bank Digital Currencies Are Coming – What Will The Consequences Be? [16]

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Capitulation: Public Bitcoin Miners Dump 25% of BTC Holdings Last Month [17].

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Jameson Lopp: How to manage bitcoin like a whale [18].

Tangibles Investing:

Just in case a “compromise” [19] is reached with the RINOs in the U.S. Senate on the pending H.R. 1808 gun and magazine ban, I strongly recommend that you sit down and formulate your “lifetime plans” list of full capacity magazines. Then research the vendors with the best prices on factory-made or original military issue magazines, to match your list. Go ahead and bookmark the web pages for each of those available magazines, with at least one alternate vendor, for each. Be ready to “pull the trigger” on ordering as many magazines as you can afford, immediately after you hear that any Republican senators plan to vote for the bill. As I’ve mentioned before, with no sunset clause, this law will cause the price of full-capacity magazines to skyrocket! Once word of RINO senators compromising circulates, I expect every magazine dealer in the nation to sell out all of their inventory within a week.

By the way, please consider buying your magazines from our affiliate advertisers. They include: Palmetto State Armory [20], GunMag Warehouse [21], Lone Wolf Distributors [22], KeepShooting.com [23], and Brownells [21]. (At KeepShooting.com, use promo code “sb” for a 10% discount.)

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There are now 24.4 million AR-15s and AK-style blasters owned by Americans, surpassing the number of F-150s on the road [24].

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Just as I predicted: Housing Market Peaks: Home Prices Finally Drop From All-Time Highs [25].

Provisos:

SurvivalBlog and its Editors are not paid investment counselors or advisers. Please see our Provisos [26] page for our detailed disclaimers.

News Tips:

Please send your economics and investing news tips to JWR [1]. (Either via e-mail or via our Contact form [27].) These are often especially relevant because they come from folks who closely watch specific markets. If you spot any news that would be of interest to SurvivalBlog readers, then please send it in. News items from local news outlets that are missed by the news wire services are especially appreciated. And it need not be only about commodities and precious metals. Thanks!