Mike Maharrey

Last month, Zimbabwe officials introduced a gold-backed currency in an effort to stabilize the country’s economy. At the time, I warned that a gold-backed currency would be a great step, but that it wasn’t going to solve Zimbabwe’s problems unless the government changed its ways. So far, things don’t look good.

If you listen to government officials and central bankers talk about price inflation, you might think they don’t have the foggiest idea of what caused it. It might have been supply chain problems, or perhaps it was Putin’s fault. Maybe greedy corporations are jacking up prices. Or it could be that consumer expectations are driving prices higher…

Could the world REALLY be creeping closer to a monetary gold standard? Steve Forbes sees signs that it is. In a recent article published by Forbes Magazine, Steve Forbes wrote that it may seem hard to believe, but the world is “beginning to lurch toward a gold-based monetary system.”

Are the central bankers at the Federal Reserve just winging it? It sure seems that way if you step back and take a long view of their decision-making. Fed officials project this aura of authority. You might imagine them as hyper-intelligent experts in the field of economics and finance making carefully calculated monetary policy decisions… but.

All that glitters isn’t gold. Silver also has quite a shine lately. While gold has gotten the headlines, silver has had a solid bull run over the last several months. In fact, the white metal has outperformed gold in this gold bull market. Last week, silver charted an 11 percent gain, cracking $30 an ounce for the first time in over a decade.

Could we see $27,000 gold? That seems far-fetched but financial analyst and investment banker Jim Rickards makes the case that it could happen. Gold charted a big rally in recent months, hitting a new all-time high of over $2,400 an ounce last month. Even with the higher prices, gold demand has remained robust.

Bars of gold are flying off the shelves in South Korean convenience stores. This is yet another example of the movement of gold from West to East. Korea’s largest convenience store chain, CU, has teamed up with Korea Minting and Security Printing Corporation (KOMSCO) to offer customers fingernail-sized gold bars.

Gold was up 4 percent in April, despite some profit-taking, along with headwinds from a strong dollar and waning hope for an interest rate cut. Gold hit a new all-time high of 2,431 in April, but pulled back later in the month as hopes the Federal Reserve would cut interest rates in the near future faded.

Factoring in sizeable over-the-counter (OTC) buying, gold demand charted its strongest first quarter since 2016. By including over-the-counter buying by investors, gold demand grew by 3 percent year-on-year, reaching 1,238 tons, according to data compiled by the World Gold Council.

There are cracks in the foundation of dollar dominance. Could Chinese gold be the straw that breaks the dollar’s back? In a column published by the Telegraph, economist Julian Jessop points out that people have been predicting the dollar’s demise for decades. Eventually, they’ll be right.

Central banks continued to steadily add gold to their reserves in March. On net, central banks globally increased their gold holdings by 16 tons, according to the latest data compiled by the World Gold Council. Buyers added 40 tons of gold to their reserves. This was offset by a net 25 tons in sales.

If the hotter-than-expected March CPI data wasn’t enough to convince you, there is more evidence that the “cooling inflation” we saw late last year was transitory. The PCE data for March came out Friday – hotter than expected. You might be picking up on a theme here…

The Federal Reserve has a $34.5 trillion problem. And the problem is growing. Yes, I’m talking about the national debt. How is the debt the Fed’s problem? It hamstrings the Fed’s ability to fight price inflation. In a recent interview, Crescat Capital macro strategist Tavi Costa told Kitco News that soaring debt levels could ultimately render…

Did you know Thomas Jefferson and many other prominent Founding Fathers predicted our current economic problems? No, they didn’t have a crystal ball. They didn’t need one. All they needed was an understanding of money and human nature. The founders recognized the “evils” of paper money…

Big money managers are starting to jump on the gold bandwagon as inflation worries grow. Over the last few weeks, gold held its ground despite headwinds including a strong dollar and rising bond yields. Geopolitical tensions have supported safe-haven buying but it appears a new player is entering the market – hedge funds

Americans throw away millions of dollars in coins every year. That’s because American money is junk. But that wasn’t always the case. In an article published by the Wall Street Journal, Reworld, a Pennsylvania waste management facility, claimed that Americans toss about $68 million worth of coins every year.

Indians are known to have a love affair with gold. India ranks as the number two gold-consuming country in the world behind only China. But Indians are also pretty fond of silver. In fact, India is the world’s biggest silver consumer.
And Indian silver demand is surging.

After moderating credit card spending in January, American consumers pulled out the plastic yet again in February. Credit card balances surged, driving overall consumer debt up by another $14.1 billion – Americans now owe $5.05 trillion in consumer debt, according to the latest data from the Federal Reserve.

Gold has surged to record highs of over $2,350 per ounce, and there is reason to believe this bull run has plenty of legs left. Gold dipped below $2,000 for the last time in mid-February. Since that time, it has gained nearly 18 percent. But despite the rally, a lot of investors in the West have not jumped on the bandwagon – yet.

Many American founders warned us about paper money. Thomas Paine summed it up best: “The evils of paper money have no end.” In an 1814 letter to Thomas Cooper, Thomas Jefferson was prophetic. “Every thing predicted by the enemies of banks, in the beginning, is now coming to pass. We are to be ruined now by the deluge of bank paper.”

Gold broke another intraday record on Monday. This continues the gold bull run that has been ongoing for several weeks. But there is something else happening that’s quite unusual. Treasury bond yields are also rising. As gold was setting records on Monday, yields on the long end of the Treasury curve were also rising.

Holding fiat currency is risky business and that’s not going to change any time soon. Currency risk is one of the factors driving the recent rally in gold and silver. It’s no coincidence that the recent gold and silver rally started as the U.S. ramped up threats to seize Russian dollar assets. However, using the dollar as a foreign policy hammer is just…

Economics once again defied the will of politicians — this time in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Minneapolis City Council wanted to help out Uber and Lyft drivers, so it passed an ordinance setting a minimum wage for drive-share drivers where companies such as Uber and Lyft must now pay their drivers a minimum of $1.40 per mile

You’ll often hear precious metals investors talk about the gold-silver ratio. So, what is it, and why does it matter? The gold-silver ratio tells you how many ounces of silver it takes to buy one ounce of gold given the current spot price of both metals. In other words, it tells you the price of gold in ounces of silver.

The Fed created the Bank Term Funding Program (BTFP) after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank last March. The program was set up so banks could easily access cash “to help assure banks have the ability to meet the needs of all their depositors.” The bailout was a sweetheart deal for banks

Gold has garnered a lot of attention in the last few weeks with its record-setting run. Since the end of February, gold is up nearly 7 percent and set an all-time record of $2,195 an ounce along the way. This is really good news for silver. That wasn’t a typo. I meant silver. I’ve been arguing that silver is drastically underpriced for quite a while.

Price inflation is like the gum on the bottom of your shoe that you just can’t scrape off. Or maybe it’s like a movie theater floor after a big premiere. It’s sticky. And that’s a problem. The CPI data for February wasn’t anything to panic about. But nobody is throwing a party either.

Can you borrow your way to prosperity? American consumers are certainly giving it the old college try. Consumer debt surged once again in January, rising by $19.5 billion, according to the latest data from the Federal Reserve. On an annual basis, consumer debt rose by 4.7 percent to a record $5.04 trillion. The jump was double the projection.