“The Financial Jigsaw” has been serialised here and now is replaced by this weekly “Letter from Great Britain.”
NOTE – If anyone would like an electronic copy of the complete book, I should be pleased to email a free PDF on request to: [email protected].
BOOK UPDATE:
A hardcopy of my book, “The Financial Jigsaw” is now available priced at £25 GBP plus P&P in A4, workbook format, bound with clear plastic covers, printed locally on demand. Please email: [email protected] with your order, I will offer a quotation for shipping to your area, and please include your full postal address. TIP: Readers often work with the free PDF in conjunction with the easy-to-read hardcopy for quick access to internet links and especially the footnotes.
Last week I noted that the Brits were displaying their “stiff upper lip” and “taking things on the chin”. But of course, later on, I indicated that the Brits were not returning to their offices in anything like the numbers that their European partners were in France and Italy. How can this be? After all, our fathers and grandfathers carried on regardless all through the war: “Stay Calm and Carry On” were the watchwords!
The linked article is probably one of the most important ones you will have ever read about COVID-19; it describes in detail exactly what has gone wrong with our experts understanding of the lethality of the virus and why these unprecedented lockdowns have been continuing – unnecessarily – for some time. It shows how the experts got hopelessly muddled in their thinking and analysis of the numbers resulting in flawed models and precipitating a dreadful economic crisis.
If it wasn’t planned, then why have our politicians not fessed up and done something about it? Make up your own minds on that one. Read on:
https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2020/09/04/covid-why-terminology-really-matters/
And talking of grandfathers, it is worth considering what they went through during their lifetimes for a realistic perspective. I read this the other day and marvelled at the resilience of my grandfather’s generation. Perhaps their admirable personal attributes, endemic at the turn of the 20th century, will arise for the 21st century when our Millennials and GenZers are the responsible generation?
“It’s a mess out there now. For a small amount of perspective at this moment, imagine you were born in 1900. On your 14th birthday, World War I starts, and ends on your 18th birthday. 22 million people perish in that war. Later in the year, a Spanish Flu epidemic hits and continues until your 20th birthday. 50 million people die from it in those two years. Yes, 50 million.
On your 29th birthday, the Great Depression begins. Unemployment hits 25%, the World GDP drops 27%. That runs until you are 33. The country nearly collapses along with the world economy. When you turn 39, World War II starts. On your 41st birthday, the United States is fully pulled into WWII. Between your 39th and 45th birthday, 75 million people perish in the war.
Smallpox was epidemic until you were in your 40’s, killing 300 million people during your lifetime. At 50, the Korean War starts. 5 million perish. From your birth, until you are 55 you dealt with the fear of Polio, experiencing friends and family being paralyzed and/or dying. At 55 the Vietnam War begins.
During the Cold War, you lived each day with the fear of nuclear annihilation. On your 62nd birthday you have the Cuban Missile Crisis, a tipping point in the Cold War. Life on our planet, as we know it, almost ended. When you turn 75, the Vietnam War finally ends. 4 million people perish in that conflict.
Think of everyone on the planet born in 1900. How did they endure all of that? Let’s try to keep things in perspective.”
https://milleronthemoney.com/whos-betting-on-america/
And having reviewed the past, this is where my friend, David Haggith has some realistic future projections for 2020. [I have edited accordingly]. It applies of necessity to America because they are leading the global economy and the Fed controls the weaponised dollar. Great Britain will not escape most of these projected effects and is already experiencing many of them.
“During this time of economic crisis, most of the predictions listed below are current events that are almost certain to continue as the major trends of 2020 and are likely to even worsen, plunging us into the chaos of a deep economic collapse, worse than 2008:
The social unrest of BLM will become even more widespread and intense. Additional social unrest over forced social distancing will reappear around the nation as distancing measures return, [update: and the election becomes violently disputed by the loser].
Social unrest over corporate bailouts is likely to begin as the Federal Reserve and government stack up mega bailouts for the rich (or as bailouts already given become known) via the insanely rich BlackRock, which has been given a monopoly on administering handouts for which only the wealthiest qualify.
All those social conflicts will negatively impact some local businesses already hurting badly from the COVID-19 lockdown because they will be unable to reopen due to the protests at a time when we cannot afford anything that causes further damage to business.
Protestors will increase the spread of COVID-19, as will reopening; ending the stock market’s fantasy of a V-shaped recovery. Even if the Corona crisis, [or the reaction to it], is a trumped-up hoax as some say, the same scenario will give the hoax all kinds of new [and news] stories to grow on.
Travel and hospitality will certainly remain in deep depression as COVID-19 stages resurgences. Lack of travel assures a continued rise in bankruptcies [not only] in the oil and gas industry. Shutdowns of major [autumn] events will depress local business and government revenue as will shutdown of sports events and concerts.
Local governments will be forced to downsize staffing quickly and cut back projects of all kinds due to hugely diminished tax revenue caused by all the troubles listed here, causing a new wave of job losses, not just in government but in companies that contract for government projects.
Diminished policing will result in a crime wave across America. Some of that will result from police department defunding; some will be required in other ways by liberal governments seeking to placate protestors; and a lot will happen because police officers resign and no new people [will] want to become police in the present atmosphere. This will be as damaging to Black communities as to White and will have a suppressive effect on economic activity.
Business uncertainty due to the continuing trade wars and to additional COVID-19 border lockdowns, as well as inability of businesses to get parts across borders even for products produced and sold within the nation, will act like gravity on the hope of economic lift. [What a time to be doubling down on trade wars, but here we go already! And Brexit is a major headache for the Brits]
We all know the federal debt will keep growing at an exponential rate because of reduced taxes that were supposed to be paid for by a rise to 4% or better GDP growth. That’s now a distant dream when the best we will see is minus 10% GDP. Compounding the retreat in GDP and the resulting drop in tax revenues, we have increased government spending due to COVID-19 stimulus efforts. All of that will require the Federal Reserve to monetize the debt to the moon and back. At some point that will call into question the current US credit rating.
So many bonds sliding toward junk because the weak business economy will force all kinds of already risky credit to become riskier and become downgraded. Forced offloading of that debt by institutions that are not allowed to carry junk bonds, will cause huge bond market problems and defaults by those who can no longer refinance by issuing new bonds. That will force the Fed to continue to soak up ever larger amounts of junkier debt, moving further down the junk spectrum, even as it also has to fund the federal government’s exploding debt plus the new exploding debts of local governments via new “special vehicles.” [SPVs]
The stock market, being utterly dependent on the Fed continuing to print money while also utterly dependent on COVID-19 keeping its head down, will go down hard again, likely this [fall] and probably again in the [next] quarter. I predict it will ultimately fall lower than its nadir in March. That will cause more wealth evaporation, leading to more natural economic tightening across the financial and business spectrum. [The elites will panic]
The second wave of COVID-19 will be worse than the first when the fall flu season hits, given that the hottest rise in cases is happening in our hottest states. That makes it obvious that climate temperature does nothing to slow the spread.
Some major banks and other financial institutions in Europe, such as Deutsche Bank, and in other nations will crash [and be bailed out]. US institutions [may] get pulled down by their associations.
Many businesses will never reopen even though the economy has been reopened legally. Many others that do re-open will close for good before long because partial reopening is not enough to sustain them and, in some cases, may even cause them to lose more money than if they stayed closed. (Already, as I predicted prior to the opening would happen all across America, I see restaurants in my own area that did not reopen, and I’ve talked to people in restaurants that did reopen who say they are not even able to fill their reduced 50% capacity under social distancing rules because they can’t get enough customers to return. Restaurants are a slim-margin business, so many will fail.) And that is even if the Corona crisis doesn’t have resurgence.
More shopping malls that were already marginal will close forever after reopening because of the number of businesses that do not return or that fail during the partial reopening. That, in turn, will have a knock-on effect for other surrounding businesses that now experience less traffic.” David continues:
“Due to the continuing sweep of all the problems listed above, we are in for a deep, long-term jobs depression. That means housing and commercial real-estate will crash again as long-term unemployment and business losses result in mortgage defaults. The resulting deep slowdown in construction will mean even more job losses. That means some US banks will crash (or have to be bailed out by the Fed) (though maybe not until 2021) due to all the loan problems caused by all of the above, resulting in even more job losses.
Add to all of these near certainties, the growing possibilities of more international wars that we already see rising in risk — North Korea v. South Korea, North Korea v. the US, Israel v. Iran, Israel v. the Palestinians over annexation of parts of the West Bank, Saudi Arabia v. Yemen, China v. Taiwan, China v. Nepal, China v. the US, India v. Pakistan. Many of these conflicts seem to have intensified over the past year, and that’s just a short list of currently rising or continuing international conflicts.
Civil wars within various nations are more likely because of the rising economic troubles and social strife listed here as well as continued growing strife due to immigration pressures that developed under globalization. I won’t predict the US dollar will collapse, BUT … this is the FIRST year in which I’ve ever said that is a reasonable possibility. Until now, it lay dimly in the future. Nations are angry over how the dollar has been repeatedly weaponized by the US via sanctions. So, I am certain the indomitable dollar will finally start to experience struggles of its own due to all the problems listed here, which will result in the Federal Reserve being less able to manage the financial chaos nationally and internationally, and due to competition from new central bank digital currencies this year, maybe, but especially next.
Add to all of that the normal economic crises from major exogenous events, such as earthquakes, volcanism, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, droughts, pestilence, wildfires, and, oh, an asteroid or two. The difference this year is that those big catastrophes will be hitting badly crippled economies and stressed societies wherever they hit in this world. (We cannot know what will hit or whether the number of such events will be lighter or heavier than other years because these are black-swan events — things we know CAN happen but have no knowledge of the specific likelihood of any particular event in a particular area in any given year. What we do know is that nations struggling under an economic crisis and an emergency health crisis will be less able to manage those events when they hit. Organizations like FEMA will be stretched way beyond their capacities.)
That’s a long list of finger-in-the-wind economic predictions. I’m not saying all of them will be dominant trends this year, and I can’t say when or in what order each one will happen; but I am certain 80% or more of my 2020 economic predictions will play out as stated above, and that is more than enough to assure the deep economic depression I’ve named “The Epocalyse.”
Reported by David Haggith at: https://thegreatrecession.info/blog/ Prepare accordingly. The original report was found at ZeroHedge in June 2020:
Now that UK has left EUROPE I will comment on relevant EU – UK events as they arise:
The big news this week is about the ongoing saga of Brexit negotiations. It is looking more likely that Britain will bail out in a no-deal on 1st January 2021 but EU history indicates that there is always a last minute compromise:
“A post-Brexit trade deal with the EU is hanging in the balance after Brussels demanded the UK abandon plans to override key elements of the Withdrawal Agreement” (WA): https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/eu-delivers-ultimatum-abandon-plans-to-override-wa-or-deal-is-off/11/09/ AND
http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/world/op-ed-goodbye-britain-uk-to-be-a-failed-state-or-non-existent/article/577803 Not a complimentary report!
To be continued next week.
Basically, everything is great. I just remember my grampa and my dad talking about bombs falling from the sky and how they were starving and life isn’t so bad.
Oh, I had to laugh Yahsure, thanks for making my day! 🙂