The unicorns are dying.
Markets seemed to really wake up to the plight of the unicorn when WeWork aborted its much-anticipated IPO, but the air started coming out of the unicorn bubble long before WeWork’s IPO demise.
Unicorns are privately held companies valued over $1 billion. Companies like Lyft, Chewie, Uber and WeWork were the darlings of WallStreet. Their IPOs were much-anticipated by investors. They are also the poster children for easy-money induced market mania, and their IPOs were crucial for maintaining the bubble.
ETF gold holding reached all-time highs in September.
Globally, gold-backed ETFs added 75.2 tons of metal to their holdings last month, according to the most recent data released by the World Gold Council. That brought total gold holdings to 2,808 tons, eclipsing the previous record set back in 2012 when the price of gold was near $1,700 per ounce.
Yesterday, Jerome Powell announced that the Fed will soon launch another round of quantitative easing. Except he insisted it will not be doing quantitative easing.
This is not QE. In no sense is this QE.”
What the Fed will be doing, according to Powell, is expanding its balance sheet. Powell said details of the process will be explained in the following days, but it will involve the purchase of Treasurys.
This sounds an awful lot like QE, as Peter Schiff emphasized in his podcast.
China has accumulated more than 100 tons of gold since it resumed buying the yellow metal last December in a quest to diversify its reserves away from the US dollar.
The People’s Bank of China added another 5.9 tons of gold to its hoard in September, according to data on its website reported by Bloomberg. It was the 10th straight month of gold-buying for the Chinese central bank and it added to the 99.8 tons accumulated during the prior nine months.
The following article was written by South Carolina state Rep. Stewart Jones. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of Peter Schiff or SchiffGold.
The Federal Reserve just lowered interest rates for the second time this year and announced more quantitative easing by injecting even more US dollars into the market. The days of cheap money will soon come to an end, and I fear that many people won’t realize what’s happening until the rug is pulled out from under them.
Last week, we got bad news in the manufacturing sector. The ISM index of national factory activity dropped to a 10-year low. It was the second straight month the number was below 50, which indicates a contraction in manufacturing. That news sent stock markets into a tailspin. This was followed up by a very week service sector report the following day.
In his most recent podcast, Peter Schiff said the service sector is about to follow manufacturing into recession. He also talked about the recent employment numbers and explained how the Fed is acting like a Soviet Politburo.
Interest in silver investment has increased significantly in recent months. According to a report commissioned by the Silver Institute and put together by Metals Focus, silver investment has increased across a range of available instruments including physical metal, exchange-traded products (ETP) and in the futures markets.
Increased market volatility, a return to easy-money policies by central banks, geopolitical uncertainty and deteriorating economic conditions have spurred investment in safe-haven assets including silver. The silver price began the year at $15.44 per ounce. As of the end of September, the white metal was up 11%. Silver posted a yearly high of $19.30 on Sept. 4, a level not seen since 2016.
So, what do you have in your basement?
My house in Kentucky is built on a concrete slab. And right now I’m in Florida. Here we call a basement an in-ground pool. So, I can’t really answer that question. But my grandfather had a basement. It was full of junk.
I’m guessing that’s probably the norm.
It was a bumpy ride in the markets this week. Right now, volatility is the name of the game – in both stocks and precious metals. People are getting nervous out there with some pretty grim economic data this week stirring up recession fears. Meanwhile, the US government just keeps spending money it doesn’t have. Host Mike Maharrey talks about all of this and more in this week’s episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast.
The US national debt increased by $1.2 trillion in fiscal 2019, which ended Sept. 30. This follows on the heels of a $1.27 trillion increase in the national debt in fiscal 2018.
