Extend and Pretend…”Because the name of the game is extend and pretend, rinse – repeat, rinse – repeat, rinse – repeat to infinity if the fascists / oligarchs stuffing the status quo down our throats has their way.”
By: CAPTAINHOOK
GoldSeek.com
Monday, 23 February 2015
To say we live in a bipolar world these days, a world characterized by white or black parallels up and down the spectrum of life, should be obvious to all by now as the extremes continue to become increasingly profound. And this should be no surprise to anybody with a full 70% of American’s on mind-altering drugs – stoned, distracted and delusional – allowing the populace to continue accepting an increasingly perverse ‘new normal’ – the dope makes extend and pretend possible with an increasingly placated population. What’s more, everyday life still appears quite normal for those not yet disenfranchised from the materialistic dream, the ‘American Way’; however, in the subconscious, people are beginning to show more noticeable panicky behavior because of untenable / unsustainable stress, with participants in the world’s bond markets no exception. Here again, it should be no surprise to people this is occurring with an aging and asset heavy baby boomer generation literally panicking about finding yield in order to generate retirement income – accounting for the continued plunge in bond yields up and down the curve – both on this side of the pond and abroad.
Of course you can’t blame yield chasers for being panicked about the situation these days, because although they are dealing with this dilemma improperly, the blame is squarely on the shoulders of central planners and oligarchs as they attempt to preserve the status quo via financial engineering. Better known as financial repression, the most commonly known element of which being quantitative easing (QE), or monetization, central control of a growing number of markets both domestically and internationally is driving people nuts because supply ad demand dynamics are being bent – a situation that will not end well. And while the US has officially ended QE (still lots of back and side door QE), Europe has just officially instituted its first program under this guise (designed to shock the market), however it would not be surprising to see the Fed back at it if stocks begin to decline impulsively once again, albeit the next program is likely to widen out in scope for various reasons. (i.e. to include stocks in a bigger and more public fashion [again to shock the market] than is already the case.) Because maintaining the bubbles in both stocks and bonds are important to the Fed if their increasingly desperate behavior is any indication.
Because the name of the game is extend and pretend, rinse – repeat, rinse – repeat, rinse – repeat to infinity if the fascists / oligarchs stuffing the status quo down our throats has their way. And as the desperation to extend and pretend grows, the measures that must be taken in order to keep the bubble economy(s) growing become increasingly desperate as well (emphasis on the unprecedented debt / bond bubble), with the newest incarnation negative interest rates, a condition already being aggressively instituted in imploding European economies, and soon coming to an economy near you. Again, negative interest rate policy is essentially backdoor money printing designed to not show up in money supply measures and / or multipliers so that inflation measures, with precious metals at center, don’t take off. This kind of thing can only go on for so long before the ‘jig is up’ however, where repression measures to suppress the true inflation barometer, precious metals, centered in the West’s faulty and fraudulent paper pricing mechanisms, can no longer contain the deception. How the new COMEX precious metals platform in Hong Kong fairs over the next year will be the tell on how it’s already challenged state should be gauged – so watch closely. (i.e. if it does not dominate it will die.)
Because again, it’s all about extend and pretend and the panic to maintain the illusion of status quo, which at its heart promotes living beyond our means and senseless materialism, but is sold as ‘healthy living and a sustainable model’ – and to hell with the consequences. Apparently it doesn’t matter how much debt is built up (and there is a lot of it now), especially if you are on good drugs. As alluded to above however, this is quite a cavalier attitude towards the situation considering the bond bull market is likely on its last legs, reaching all-time manic proportions as we speak. It’s that panic for yield we were discussing above. And this is what keeps capital flowing into dividend yielding stocks as well. Of course this will only work well until something pricks the bubble(s) and capital losses begin to outweigh dividend gains, which is already a problem for growing numbers of widely held companies. Oh and least we forget that as market breadth narrows on the broads as process unfolds, pretty soon fixed income ETF’s will be the only issues remaining buoyant, again, until that bubble pops too. So many bubbles to pop – with so little time remaining. (See Figure 1)
The Rest…HERE
