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. In this column, JWR also covers hedges, derivatives, and various obscura. Most of these items are from JWR’s “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective. Today, we look at copper supply and prices. (See the Commodities section.)

Precious Metals:

John Rubino: Gold Or Silver?

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Arkadiusz Sieroń, at Gold-Eagle.com: The Fed’s Crossroads – Hawkish or Dovish? JWR’s Comments:  My appraisal is that the Fed will be pressured by the U.S. Treasury to relent on raising interest rates, most likely  before May. The higher rates are making the annual interest portion of the Federal budget quite painful.  In 2022, the government was spending $4 billion per day, just on interest payments, and of course, that figure will be much higher, in 2023. Bottom line:  It won’t be hawkish. It won’t be dovish. They are going to chicken out!  A chicken is a sort of oversized dove.  Regardless of a Federal Reserve rate pivot, we can expect to see higher silver and gold prices, in 2023.

Economy & Finance:

WND: Biden admin announces 15-year green economics plan.

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Reader H.L. sent us this: Households earning $100,000 or more are cutting spending more aggressively. What’s going on?

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Rate Cuts And QT?

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Billionaires in blue states face coordinated wealth-tax bills.

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Number of U.S. restaurants per capita at 25-year low.

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At Zero Hedge: Beige Book Finds “Little Growth” Ahead”, Increasing Difficulty For Retailers To Pass Cost Increases.

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Republicans worry a national sales tax bill would be a ‘political gift’ for Democrats.

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Major Social Security trust funds could be tapped out by 2033: CBO.

Commodities:

Copper is now at $9,288 per metric ton. That is back up to where it was in June, 2022.

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Copper Shortage Getting Real.

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Ted Cruz Challenges the Sale of Oil to the Communist Party of China.

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From OilPrice News: Saudi Arabia Is Open To Discuss Non-Dollar Oil Trade Settlements.

Inflation Watch:

BLS quietly changes the way it calculates the Consumer Price Index JWR’s Comment: Weary of the now chronically-high inflation figures, the Bidenistas have come up with a brilliant solution: Skew their figures lower. The latest CPI legerdemain: Monkeying with the sales figures for new and used cars.

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RAND blog: The Inflation Pain You Don’t See.

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Why gas prices are surging this month.

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Fitch: January 2023 Inflation Tracker: Global Inflation On The Decrease, But Still Early For A Dovish Pivot.

Forex & Cryptos:

Pound Sterling and Euro are a Buy against the Dollar in 2023 says HSBC.

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USD TO CAD AND CAD TO USD FORECAST 2023, 2024-2026.

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Dollar Collapse Is Now In Motion, Saudi Arabia Signals The End Of ‘Petro’ Status.

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Charles Hugh Smith: Contrarian Thoughts on the Petro-Yuan and Gold-Backed Currencies.

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How the blare of a crypto mine woke up this Blue Ridge Mountain town.

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Do you own any crypto?  IRS Warns Taxpayers They Must Answer a New Question on Tax Forms or Face Consequences.

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Rug pulls: uncovering crypto fraud.

Tangibles Investing:

Used vehicle prices are falling but not enough to offset grossly inflated levels.

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The Future Of The Collector Car Market In 2023.

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GunMag Warehouse (one of our affiliate advertisers) is running a special on ETS Gen 2 9mm 32-Round Magazines for Glock double-stack pistols, at just $6.99 each. (If you select the black color box and put them in your shopping cart, then the special $6.99 price will show up.)  I suggest that you buy at least a dozen of these, for your “barter” box. They are also running sales on 10-packs of a variety of rifle magazines, including AR PMAGs, AR Hexmags, and AR Lancer Warfighter magazines.

Provisos:

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

News Tips:

Please send your economics and investing news tips to JWR. (Either via e-mail or via our Contact form.) 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. Thanks!