Monday was the day the world’s capital markets turned into a giant fiat money casino. Consider yourself forewarned. You might be able to trade your way to profits in this market on the tide of easy money being printed now by the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank (ECB). But the financial markets are setting up for the mother of all collapses.

Prior to last Monday, I had imagined that the end of the super-cycle in fiat money would take years to unfold. I’m revising my forecast. The end may be approaching even faster than I expected. The piecemeal nationalization of certain industries…the transference of private sector liabilities to the public sector’s balance sheet…the abrogation of contract in the form of defaulted mortgages that are not foreclosed on…and the ever-rising debt-to-GDP ratios were all signs that governments everywhere were sucking the life out of the economy to preserve the status quo, while simultaneously turning dozens of firms and institutions into zombies with no real productive economic future.

But Monday was a day that sent a bit of a chill down my spine. Granted, the ECB’s €750 billion bailout package did wonders for various financial markets. And if you’re a speculator – and especially a high- yield bond hunter – why not get on the gravy train? If the ECB is going to print money to buy public and private sector debts to “ensure depth and liquidity” in certain markets, it’s not a trend you want to fight. For now.

…..read more HERE

Bulk manganese specialist Helen O’Malley of London-based CRU sheds some light on the seldom-discussed metal. In this exclusive interview with The Gold Report, O’Malley offers her insights on the metal’s supply and demand fundamentals and discusses the manganese market, which is driven largely by China. She also highlights several junior mining companies on her radar……

….read it all HERE

Betting on the Raw Materials

Energy Report’s Equities and Economics Report writer Victor Gonçalves says the cobalt story is still yet to come. In this exclusive Energy Report interview, Victor also explains how to tell the real rare earth companies from the wannabes.

….read more HERE

Puget Ventures One Step Closer to Becoming Canadian Cobalt Producer

via the Midas Letter:

At this very moment as you gaze at your laptop screen while your cell phone buzzes away in the background, there looms a potential future bereft of the glittering devices that have become a fundamental part of your life and an extension of yourself. You may not have known that there was a threat, in the form of a shortage of Rare Earth Elements used in electronics, to the continued existence of our beloved iPhones and iPads but it looks as though you can rest assured of being able to get your hands on the latest electronics in the future and you may have Puget Ventures Inc (TSXV: PVS) to thank for that.

…read more HERE

(Ed Note: Puget Ventures is an advertiser on Money Talks_

As the currency and financial systems of the developed world’s social-welfare-states head towards their doom, the battles between King Kong (Mother Nature and Darwin) versus Godzilla (public servants and banksters) continue.  After generations of defying the reality that you must produce more than you consume, the social welfare states are being presented with the bill for their unpayable social obligations. 

Modern day kings and their courts in developed world capitals are learning what King Canute once did: you CANNOT stop the tides from rolling over you; man is not god; he cannot command nature or defy its laws (i.e., survival of the fittest and producing more than you consume or perish/submit to those who do) and to believe he can is FALSE.  POLITICS and MAN WILL NOT PREVAIL OVER NATURE or MARKETS (which are nature).

Morally and fiscally-bankrupt public servants, ratings agencies and finance ministers can try to DECLARE that bankrupt sovereigns and financial systems are AAA, but it does not change the fact that they are BANKRUPT.  They only produce PAPER illusions and, like governments and kingdoms in history tried to turn lead into gold, this form of sovereign alchemy will FAIL as well.  We only wait for history to roll over them like the tides.  The farther they climb out on the limb, the bigger the coming economic and financial system CRASH.

Black swans are taking flight in a number of areas; the “when hope turns to fear moment” continues to advance towards the social welfare states.
Broken promises loom.  First, the entitlement promises to the something-for-nothings which have driven us to this point, and then, ultimately, to the holders of Bonds through the IOU’s in which they are denominated, known as G7 currencies (US dollars, British Pounds, Euros, Swiss Francs, Aussie and Canadian dollars.)

The greatest transfer of wealth from those who store it in paper to those who don’t has commenced: A Crack-up Boom is on the horizon……

….read more HERE