The National Guard is currently deployed in three cities in the United States: Washington D.C., Los Angeles and Memphis.
While troops were briefly deployed in Chicago, they were blocked from activation by a judge on October 9. Similarly, court rulings have stopped the rollout of Oregon’s own National Guard members to Portland, as well as the deployment of National Guard troops from California to Portland.
In June, U.S. President Donald Trump ordered some 4,100 troops of the National Guard to Los Angeles amid protests against immigration raids. This was despite backlash from California Governor Gavin Newsom, who rejected the move.
While the vast majority of these personnel have now been demobilized, around 300 were still on duty there as of the start of September.
As Statista’s Anna Fleck shows in the chart below, it soon became clear that it was not a standalone act, with the Trump administration then deploying roughly 2,300 troops to Washington D.C. in August, including some 800 from D.C., this time on account of countering crime and homelessness. While authorities in Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, Ohio and West Virginia told the Associated Press that they plan to withdraw their troops from the capital in late October and November, it remains unclear when the remaining out-of-state troops will also leave.
This wind down, however, comes as the Trump administration has pushed to increase the National Guard’s presence in other U.S. cities, including the aforementioned Chicago and Portland. Trump has also suggested over the past months sending troops to several other cities, including San Francisco, Oakland, St. Louis, Mo., Baltimore, New Orleans and New York City.
While most Americans do not support military involvement unless it’s against an external threat, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry has requested that 1,000 Louisiana National Guard Troops be activated “throughout the state to urban centers”, to address crime, mentioning Shreveport, Baton Rouge and New Orleans specifically.
In a moment that has since gone viral, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. commented on President Trump’s recent remarks that he doesn’t know if he will get to heaven.
During a briefing in the Oval Office regarding an effort to surge fertility in the U.S. (more on that later) Kennedy told Trump “You didn’t believe you were gonna get to heaven… You are doing God’s WORK here.”
“You’ve made peace in the Middle East…and now, you’re giving millions of Americans a chance to have babies,” RFK continued as Trump listened intently with a huge smile on his face.
“You’re doing this while the government is locked down, by the Democrats,” Kennedy further remarked.
“This is because of your energy, commitment and vision. And I want to thank you for allowing me to be part of it,” Kennedy graciously concluded.
Watch:
🚨 BREAKING: In an incredible moment, Secretary Bobby Kennedy responds to President Trump saying he won’t get to heaven
“You didn’t believe you were gonna get to heaven…YOU are doing GOD’S WORK here!”
Prior to those comments, Secretary Kennedy declared America’s declining birth rate to be a “National security threat.”
“When my uncle was president, the fertility rate in this country was 3.5 percent. Today it is 1.6 percent,” Kennedy urged.
He continued, “The replacement rate – in other words, the amount of fertility you need to keep your population even – is 2.1 percent. We are below replacement.”
“President Trump is addressing the root causes,” the Secretary asserted.
🚨 JUST NOW: Secretary Kennedy declares America’s declining birth rate a “NATIONAL SECURITY threat” pic.twitter.com/eGgkWr15t7
“When my uncle was president, the fertility rate in this country was 3.5 percent. Today it is 1.6%. The replacement rate – in other words, the amount of…
Dr. Mehmet Oz, head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services also commented that President Trump’s goal is to surge American birth rates.
“I know what you’re all thinking. You’re probably right: there are gonna be a lot of Trump babies,” Oz quipped, adding “I think that’s probably a good thing!”
“You have to address we had 3.6 million babies last year…that’s half a million less babies than we ideally would have even to replace our current population,” he further warned.
🚨 JUST IN: Dr. Mehmet Oz CONFIRMS that President Trump’s goal is to surge American birth rates
“I know what you’re all thinking. You’re probably right: there are gonna be a lot of Trump babies. I think that’s probably a good thing!”
Trump himself took the podium to describe how he intends to surge affordable fertility insurance coverage to American mothers nationwide, a move that will combat declining birth rates.
“The result will be healthier pregnancies, healthier babies, and many more beautiful American children. It’s a big factor. It’s a big deal,” Trump emphasised.
“For the first time ever, we will make it LEGAL for companies to offer supplemental insurance plans specifically for fertility. That’s never been done before,” he further explained.
“I’m asking all employers to make these new fertility benefit options available to their employees immediately,” Trump emphasised.
The President continued, “We are taking historic steps to vastly expand access to insurance coverage for fertility care, including IVF – something that was not covered.”
“Americans will be able to opt in to specialized coverage…they’re gonna get fertility insurance for the first time,” Trump explained, adding “This will make all fertility care, including IVF, far more affordable and accessible.”
“And by providing coverage at every step of the way, it will reduce the number of people who ultimately need to resort to IVF because couples will be able to identify and address problems early,” he further stated.
“The initiatives I’ve just announced are the boldest and most significant actions ever taken by any president to bring the miracle of life into more American homes,” the President concluded.
Watch:
🚨 BREAKING: In a historic first, President Trump takes action to SURGE affordable fertility insurance coverage to American mothers nationwide – a move that will combat declining birth rates
“The result will be healthier pregnancies, healthier babies, and many more beautiful… pic.twitter.com/L8meCZEwO5
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Boeing 747 Cargo Jet Veers Off Hong Kong Runway, Breaks Apart In Water
Flight-tracking website Flightradar24 reports that an Air ACT (ACT Airlines) Boeing 747-481 BDSF (a variant of the Boeing 747 cargo aircraft) veered off the runway at Hong Kong International Airport at 03:53 local time (19:53 UTC) and broke apart after hitting water at a ground speed of 49 knots.
According the ADS-B data AirACT flight #EK9788 went off the runway on landing in Hong Kong at 03:53 local time (19:53 UTC). pic.twitter.com/1w2hl86eGW
“A cargo plane arriving from Dubai ran off the runway and tumbled into the sea at Hong Kong International Airport early Monday, crashing into a ground-service vehicle and leaving two workers missing. Sources said the freighter struck a ground-service vehicle, shearing off one of its wheels, before coming to rest with its nose over the seawall. The four crew members on board escaped unhurt, but two ground staff inside the vehicle remain missing.”
Upper West Side Runs Out Of New Homes Despite Sky-High Prices And Incoming Communist Mayor
Even as housing prices look stretched and a divisive new mayor prepares to take office, Manhattan’s Upper West Side is running short on new homes, according to Bloomberg.
Only 51 new condo units are expected to be completed in the neighborhood through 2028, according to Corcoran Sunshine Marketing Group — a 94% drop from the 869 units added between 2016 and 2019. It’s the steepest decline among Manhattan neighborhoods tracked by the firm.
The shortage comes as demand for new construction surges. “There’s been more demand on new stuff than ever before,” said Lisa Lippman, a broker at Brown Harris Stevens. “We saw people turn away from prewars for new development with central air and instant gratification.”
Buyers have been favoring move-in-ready condos over older co-ops, deterred by renovation costs and strict board rules. In the third quarter, sales at new developments jumped 41% from a year earlier, while resales were largely flat, Corcoran data show. The neighborhood’s median price rose 8%, and homes spent a median of just 76 days on the market — the fastest in Manhattan, according to StreetEasy.
Developers have reaped the benefits. The Henry, a 45-unit project on West 84th Street by Naftali Group, is 70% sold since its September 2024 launch. Toll Brothers’ 81-unit Rockwell on West 103rd Street is 86% sold, according to Marketproof. Overall, new Upper West Side projects have sold 66% of their units, outpacing Manhattan’s 55% average.
But prices remain steep. The lowest sale at Extell Development’s 50 W. 66th St. came in at $3.6 million, while resale condos averaged $1.6 million in the third quarter. “Just like with anything, when there’s demand and little inventory, the price of Upper West Side apartments will go up,” said Miki Naftali, chief executive officer of Naftali Group.
Bloomberg writes that the pipeline is drying up for structural reasons as well. The Upper West Side has few conversion-ready office buildings and is heavily constrained by historic-district rules. Local resistance to taller towers has intensified, with lawsuits targeting Extell’s 69-story 50 W. 66th St. project, where a penthouse is listed for $85 million. Extell’s next plan — a 1,200-foot tower at the former ABC headquarters — would be the neighborhood’s tallest. The developer said it “is prepared to collaborate with community leaders” and has “voluntarily proposed” adding affordable units.
A 2019 law effectively shut down another source of new supply: rental-to-condo conversions. “Rental-to-condo conversions were one of the faster ways to add for-sale inventory and were a significant contributor to supply in the past,” said John Tashjian of Centurion Real Estate Partners. “That opportunity is closed.”
High borrowing costs and expensive land have made entry-level projects “almost impossible,” said Kelly Mack, president of Corcoran Sunshine. “It’s almost impossible to bring to market a building where they can sell at the entry-level price point.”
For longtime residents, the result is a neighborhood that feels increasingly out of reach. “These days, you have to be really rich to live here,” said Marcia Kaufman, 70, a retired teacher who recently bought an apartment at 212 W. 72nd St. “For families, it’s very, very difficult. There’s not enough space — and what you’re getting for what you’re paying isn’t much.”
We’ll see how long this condo shortage lasts once Mayor Mamdani gets his hands on the city…
What does the average person do when they run out of money before the end of the month? According to Federal Reserve data, nearly half of U.S. households report spending every penny (or more) than they earn in a typical month. Like families juggling credit cards, governments often rely on borrowing to fill the gap — only on a much larger scale.
Some people, unfortunately, turn to more desperate means to cover their debt repayments if they can no longer borrow enough money to repeat the cycle.
Why people think that governments, which are run by people, act any differently, is one of the great mysteries of our time.
The key difference is that governments can disguise overspending through complex financial mechanisms and jargon – like “quantitative easing.” That’s when the central bank creates dollars to buy government debt with this brand-new cash. It’s easy to see this expands the money supply, which dilutes the purchasing power of every other dollar in existence. And that’s just one piece of jargon – there’s a lot more. “Fiscal stimulus” or “yield curve control.”
The result, however, is the same: The government’s purchasing power grows as the public’s purchasing power quietly declines.
What governments do when they can’t borrow enough money
The cycle usually begins innocently enough. A government is short on tax revenue for something that they want to get done, so they borrow money.
Like any good money drunk, the government doesn’t ever really repay the debt, though. They just try to pay the interest so that they have more money on hand to spend while continuing to borrow more to meet more campaign promises made by politicians.
Then, when they can no longer borrow enough money to pay for programs and handouts that they want to fund, they move into theft.
Of course, it’s never called outright theft. They use terms like “quantitative easing,” which is just a fancy way of saying that they are printing more money. Of course, that has the effect of making the money in your pocket and in your bank account worth less in real time.
Call it quantitative easing, call it inflation, call it what you want. It is theft of your purchasing power that they didn’t even tell you about before doing it.
How central banks are being used to do it
As the Financial Times recently observed, analysts are increasingly calling this a new age of “fiscal dominance” – in which governments with large debts pressure central banks to keep rates low to lower debt service costs.
The thinking behind the low interest rates is that it will encourage borrowing by consumers and businesses to spur spending in the economy, which is how governments tend to think of the economy growing.
The problem with this situation is that the pressure to keep interest rates low is due to a perceived soft economy, and this perception makes global investors nervous about financing the debt of the governments over those soft economies.
Bloomberg has reported that political volatility in France and Japan is now imposing a “politics premium” on government debt – investors are demanding higher rates to compensate for governance risk.
Which is why governments start to debase their currencies so that they can continue to service the debt and borrow more.
And that’s why central banks and major investors like Ray Dalio are both buying gold and other precious metals and also recommending others to do the same. Bloomberg calls it the debasement trade:
“Sell government debt, as well as currencies… Buy gold, silver… In a nutshell that’s the ‘debasement trade’ that’s become the talk of the town.”
This is a major reason government debt and currencies are down – and on the other side of the debasement trade, gold price is up over 50% this year alone – and as of October 17, silver’s price up over 78% year-to-date. A clear reflection, according to any number of analysts, of capital fleeing debt-based financial assets in favor of tangible, physical precious metals.
Debasement isn’t a new idea
Historians trace the practice of currency dilution all the way back to ancient Rome. When there was an income crisis, rulers diluted their gold and silver coins with base metals to stretch their spending power without changing the face value of the coins. Obviously, that lowered the intrinsic value of the coins, which also lowered their purchasing power. This is the literal origin of the term “debasement.”
As IMF economist Barry Eithengreen observes, “Debasing the coinage was a convenient mode of taxation.”
Modern governments achieve the same result through money creation.
Today, Washington’s version of that same process appears in fiscal reports: Total U.S. federal debt is currently flirting with $38 trillion ($37.942 trillion precisely, according to the Department of the Treasury).
Each new round of borrowing, every day’s debt auction, injects more dollars into circulation – subtly diluting the purchasing power of every other dollar in existence.
That’s what modern debasement looks like – the same result, but much harder for the public to detect compared to classic debasement of silver and gold coins…
Regardless, citizens and savers are on the losing end of that process.
The new norm
Over the past decade, major central banks have collectively expanded their balance sheets by more than $25 trillion, according to the IMF.2
That expansion has become a standing feature of fiscal policy – what some economists now call “structural debasement.” That’s “structural” because inevitable debasement is built into the system.
It gets worse every year, and central banks and wise investors are recognizing that debt, loans to governments and currencies alike, cannot be expected to increase in value after inflation.
It’s the same dynamic economists describe when they warn that nominal gains can mask real losses once we factor in inflation. Something retirees living on fixed incomes experience firsthand all too often.
Governments have grown accustomed to spending more than they collect – a permanent, structural imbalance. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the U.S. has run deficits annually since 2001. Fiscal watchdogs note that despite years of debate, neither party has advanced a credible long-term plan to balance the federal budget.
The recent government shutdown illustrates the stalemate. As Reuters explains, one side wants more domestic spending, the other more defense spending – but both agree on spending more rather than spending less.
The trend is clear – now let’s focus on what we can do about it.
Even the darkest cloud has a silver lining
Because the majority of our savings are in dollars, their ultimate purchasing power depends on inflation and monetary policy. The dollar has lost over 90% of its purchasing power since the Federal Reserve’s founding, according to U.S. CPI data.3 This means we cannot predict the future purchasing power of today’s savings.
But remember, when currencies lose purchasing power, assets with intrinsic values increase in price. Right now, precious metals are soaring because everything else is starting to look a lot riskier… I’m calling this trend The Great Repricing.
The ongoing debasement of global currencies seems inevitable. There’s just too much debt, and too much resistance to lower spending. I’m not talking about the U.S. alone – this is a global phenomenon, in France and the UK and Japan most notably.
The only real question is how far will your dollars go in the brave new world ahead? A lot of other people are asking the same question – and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that gold and silver prices have exploded so far this year.
More Money Is Lost In Credit From Forced Selling Than Defaults
By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities
ProSec and Credit Risk
If you missed Thursday’s piece titled Is ProSec the New ESG, then I highly recommend checking it out. In fact, I almost stopped writing today just to make sure people saw that. So many interesting conversations on the back of that, and we think it deserves a read. We think that Production for Security (or ProSec) is going to shape government, corporate, and investment decisions for years to come.
It dovetails well with They’re Baaack… where we argue that “this time is different” in terms of trade negotiations with China.
In many ways, it is difficult (and painful) to realize that Academy published a joint T-Report/SITREP/Sustainability report titled Rare Earths – A National Security Threat back in February, 2021! Almost 5 years later, we seem to be finally waking up to the threat and the opportunity – ProSec™.
I really want to stop here. Mostly because I don’t want to dilute the message, but also because we have “stolen” some nice weather in mid-October and it seems to be a shame to be typing when there are so many better things to do. But…
More Money is Lost in Credit from Forced Selling than Defaults
Default this. Default that. So many headlines around banks and credit have been about defaults. I understand that – it is easy to understand and is scary (an entire cottage industry of looking for credit problems to spark the next GFC has emerged since the last GFC).
I understand the fascination.
But I always come back to two main themes:
You can only get a financial crisis from credit when a “SAFE” asset goes bad.
Risky assets are priced and allocated accordingly. The high yield market has never posed systemic risk. It is only when “SAFE” assets go bad, that we have real problems.
S&L crisis was mis-hedged interest rate risk.
The Russia/LTCM crisis was a sovereign actually defaulting and massive bets on arcane instruments like swap spreads.
We had Enron and WorldCom, which were frauds, and created fear and losses in the otherwise safe IG market.
AAA Mortgage backed bonds.
Forced selling is what creates credit losses, far more than defaults.
I’m not even sure if Silicon Valley Bank had to sell its Treasuries, but it was the mark-to-market losses that caused the run on the bank.
SIV’s, which bought highly rated bonds based on “haircuts,” had to liquidate in the GFC as losses breached the buffers that were built in.
I do not know the lowest price that the super senior held by AIG FP traded at on the credit side, but it was “dirt” cheap and never had a loss. The “super senior” on the mortgage side had losses that didn’t fully recover but the credit side did remarkably well, once the forced selling was taken out of the equation.
My “fun” fact is that the 3% – 7% tranche of CDX IG (the “mezz” tranche) even for a 10-year trade, has never suffered a loss. I think there were mark-to-market based CLOs that had losses in investment grade tranches, but I don’t think there has ever been a loss due to credit on any IG tranche of any CLO (which is why I periodically recycle the idea that it is more difficult to break a AAA CLO tranche than it is to get a perfect NCAA bracket).
So, the point here is to worry less about default risk and worry more about potential forced selling.
Is Forced Selling a Risk?
Let’s go back to our “Maslow’s Hierarchy of a Credit Bubble” chart. Yeah, maybe I’ve overused Maslow recently, but that and the Kubler Ross Stages of Grief are really useful.
In my view we’ve edged into the “Esteem” stage where leverage (which begets forced selling) is being used more frequently, but I think we are far away from the sort of trades where each small problem creates selling pressure, thereby exposing more problems.
Most Money Ever Lost By Smart Investors
This is somewhat tongue in cheek and has no empirical backing, but I think it is worth noting. Two credits where I think “smart” money lost massive amounts of money betting against the companies were:
Radio Shack. Their business model seemed to die circa the early 2000s. The brand, the locations, and the products didn’t seem to resonate. Yet, I think they didn’t have a bankruptcy until 2015 or so (I could check AI to get the right date, but it doesn’t matter – this company survived years and years past when “smart” money thought they would go under).
Brunswick. It was a company struggling before the GFC. Then during the GFC, one of their major product lines, boats, was on sale everywhere. How could this company survive? Here is their credit rating history from Bloomberg.
Baa3 08/01/2025
Baa2 08/29/2017
Baa3 08/30/2016
Baa2 06/23/2016
Ba1 06/23/2014
Ba2 11/14/2013
B2 04/20/2012
B3 07/13/2011
Caa1 01/06/2009
Ba3 10/20/2008
Baa3 07/10/2008
Baa2 03/26/2008
Baa1 07/08/2005
Look at the resilience! All the way back to investment grade!
We are debating including them in our ProSec list of companies as they manufacture boats domestically, and while “drones” get all the attention, there is a big push to develop “surface drones” to fight and defend the seas. The Navy has been discussing using a “Hellscape” as a deterrent to China going after Taiwan. The concept could go well beyond that. Could this company, with a market cap of just over $4 billion, fit into our “National Champions” framework?
The main point is that defaults often take far longer than anyone thought and sometimes fail to materialize as the corporations adapt and the business environment changes.
Private Credit Looks a Lot like Bank Lending in the 1990s
I will not belabor the point, but credit was, always, kind of, private.
One of the worst things the CDS market did is make it easy to push spreads wider, creating more forced sellers. Yes, mark-to-market is good, but are credits really as volatile as markets sometimes make them?
At its worst, small groups of lenders can create a “pretend and extend” environment. Keeping companies alive to avoid reporting losses. At its best, the same sort of behavior allows companies the breathing room they need to fix themselves.
Mark-to-market on credit is one of the trickier things out there. Anyone who traded for a living and found a “TRACE Bandit” who would use late day trades on small sizes to create TRACE prints knows how well people can be forced into “forced selling.” At the opposite end of the spectrum, denial that a credit issue is occurring is equally wrong.
I’m not sure where we are in this cycle, but everything tells me that naming something “private” helped in the AUM growth as it tied nicely with “private equity” and is now hurting the industry, despite the fact that credit has always kind of been private.
Trying not to be dismissive of the risks, but let’s not get too panicked over terms.
Bottom Line
Sell credit, of all types, if you are worried about forced selling.
If there are sellers of private credit, who cannot get bids, they will sell “liquid” credit, starting with HY (including ETFs) and move on from there, and it will impact companies that haven’t done anything wrong.
I do not see forced selling and believe that credit risk is not systemic. Therefore I remain comfortable with credit.
Away from that:
Own ProSec in every asset class (commodities, stocks, and bonds).
Shy away from companies that will struggle if “this time is different” with China – which we think it is – as China is driving the narrative more than the U.S.
Good luck and enjoy the weather! (If you are having good weather. Otherwise, enjoy something else).
Secret Service Discovers Hunting Stand Overlooking Trump’s Air Force One Exit
The US Secret Service on Thursday discovered a hunting stand in a tree near Palm Beach International Airport which had a direct line of sight to an Air Force One exit area used by President Trump.
In a Sunday post to X, FBI Director Kash Patel confirmed that the FBI and Secret Service are investigating the matter, and nobody had been linked to the stand.
“USSS spotted a suspicious stand near the AF1 zone in Palm Beach. The FBI is investigating,” Patel wrote.
USSS spotted a suspicious stand near the AF1 zone in Palm Beach.
The Secret Service’s Anthony Guglielmi confirmed to news outlets that the agency is “working closely” with the FBI and local law enforcement.
“There was no impact to any movements and no individuals were present or involved at the location,” he told Fox News, adding that Secret Service agents found the stand before Trump was due to arrive in Palm Beach.
“While we are not able to provide details about the specific items or their intent, this incident underscores the importance of our layered security measures,” he continued.
“Hunting Stand” – for all the Whitetail on Southern BLVD, located directly across the street from Palm Beach International Airport, in the median of a major highway… directly facing the Air Force One stairs (200yds). Ps the Secret Service did a GREAT job finding this… pic.twitter.com/WiVVKbt7XH
As the Epoch Times notes further, last year, a man was arrested after a Secret Service agent saw a gun barrel sticking through a fenced area near Trump’s golf course in Palm Beach County. Suspect Ryan Routh was convicted by a jury in September on charges that he sought to assassinate Trump, with prosecutors saying that Routh had been camped out near the course for hours before he was spotted.
Two months before the incident, a man identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks was shot and killed by a Secret Service counter-sniper team after he managed to fire several shots at Trump during a rally in Pennsylvania where Trump was speaking. Trump’s right ear was hit in the shooting, two others in the crowd were injured, and one man, retired firefighter Corey Comperatore, was killed while shielding his family from the bullets.
In September, prominent conservative commentator Charlie Kirk was shot and killed while speaking at a college debate event in Utah. The suspect charged in that case, Tyler Robinson, is currently being held in a Utah jail without bail. His next court date is later this month.
After Kirk’s assassination, Trump and Vice President JD Vance said that individuals who espouse far-left ideological viewpoints are fueling political violence.
“Radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives,” Trump said last month. “Tonight, I ask all Americans to commit themselves to the American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died.”
Prosecutors and officials in Utah have said that Robinson’s family said the suspect’s political views had moved to the left in recent years.
The Secret Service, in an Oct. 16 post on X, wrote that it carried out a joint training exercise at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s West Palm Beach property, that “will increase protection of the high-profile facility.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the FBI and the Secret Service for comment.
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Is This MAGA? Trump Wants Lindsey Graham Donor To Challenge ‘RINO’ Massie
Ever-determined to oust popular GOP Rep. Thomas Massie, President Trump has posted yet another anti-Massie rant on social media, trashing the libertarian-minded Kentuckian and urging failed state-level candidate Ed Gallrein to mount a midterm primary challenge. In a 250-word Friday-night post employing his trademark random capitalization, Trump wrote:
“Third Rate Congressman Thomas Massie, a Weak and Pathetic RINO from the Great Commonwealth of Kentucky, a place I love, and won big SIX TIMES, must be thrown out of office, ASAP! …
I hope Ed gets into the Race against Massie. Unlike ‘lightweight’ Massie, a totally ineffective LOSER who has failed us so badly, CAPTAIN ED GALLREIN IS A WINNER WHO WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN. Should he decide to challenge Massie, Captain Ed Gallrein has my Complete and Total Endorsement. RUN, ED, RUN.”
Going back to his first term, Trump has periodically attacked Massie, but his fury soared to new heights in June after Massie condemned Trump’s decision to unconstitutionally commit US armed forces to an attack on Iran, joining a war initiated by the State of Israel. Trump posted a lengthy tirade that concluded with an assurance that Massie would face a Trump-backed challenger in the 2026 GOP primary. Days later, the “MAGA Kentucky PAC” was created with the sole purpose of ousting Massie, funded entirely by three Israel-backing billionaires who don’t live in the state, and run by top Trump operatives Tony Fabrizio and Chris LaCivita.
The anti-Massie drive opened up with a combined $2 million contributed by Miriam Adelson, Paul Singer and John Paulsen. While the drive to end Massie’s career has plenty of money, it’s lacking something more important: a candidate. Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL whose political career consists only of a 2024 primary loss in a state senate race, thanked Trump for the encouragement, and said he’d make a decision soon. Massie was quick to ridicule his adversaries’ quest for a candidate:
“After having been rejected by every elected official in the 4th District, Trump’s consultants clearly pushed the panic button with their choice of failed candidate and establishment hack Ed Gallrein,” Massie told Politico. “Ed’s been begging them to pick him for over three months now.”
Trump asked dual citizen Miriam Adelson, a billionaire running nasty ads against me in Kentucky, “what do you love more, the United States or Israel?” She refused to answer him. He says that might mean she loves Israel more.
Though he may be unpopular with a particular strain of MAGA Republicans who put pure obedience to Trump above principles like limited government, fiscal responsibility, a non-interventionist foreign policy and fidelity to the Constitution, Massie has built a large national following of people who think he represents the conservative ideal. Trump’s launch of the anti-Massie PAC has spurred those followers to open up their checkbooks, with Massie posting his best-ever fundraising quarter, racking up $768,000 from July to September.
On Saturday, Massie’s congressional campaign account highlighted an unflattering fact about would-be challenger Gallrein:
Well look 👀 here. The hack Trump just endorsed to run against me is a Lindsey Graham donor❗️ pic.twitter.com/pePwtiHszp
To put the hypocrisy in sharp focus, Trump calls Massie a “Republican In Name Only” (RINO), yet Trump’s chosen candidate has funded the quintessential RINO. As for the validity of Trump’s RINO accusation about Massie, take a look at this sampling of Massie stances that have most angered Trump, and judge for yourself if they’re inconsistent with GOP principles:
Opposing the $2 trillion Covid-19 “relief package” in 2020
Voting against this year’s “Big Beautiful Bill” that will increase borrowing by some $4.1 trillion through 2034
Introducing legislation to end US involvement in Israel’s war on Iran
Organizing a discharge petition that, upon the House going back into session, will force a floor vote on declassifying investigative files relating to Jeffrey Epstein — something Trump calls a Democratic Party “hoax”
‼️ Trump just endorsed someone to run against me. I can beat this candidate if I have your support. We just posted our best fundraising quarter ever. Can you help me top it?https://t.co/nsEYqxVllXhttps://t.co/AgJY01JuFj
When silver surged to multi-year highs, veteran bullion dealer Andy Schectman didn’t see just another price move—he saw a rupture in the foundation of the global metals market.
In a wide-ranging interview last week, Schectman argued that what’s happening now represents the physical market finally “calling the bluff” of decades of paper manipulation.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” he began, emphasizing that this was not mere volatility. “Backwardation… shows extreme delivery stress… It’s the market exposing the shortages of physical silver, the frailty of the paper promises.”
For Schectman, “backwardation”—when spot prices exceed futures prices—isn’t just a technical quirk. It’s the alarm bell that the supply of real metal is running thin. He believes the era when investors could comfortably rely on “paper silver” derivatives is ending.
“People have accepted paper promises for a very long time and I think that’s coming to an end,” he said. “This is decisively bullish for silver and other precious metals.”
When asked what’s actually driving this rupture, Schectman pointed to signs of stress that only appear when market structures break down. Spot prices are now higher than future delivery prices—something, he said, “very rare” in silver and “a signal of desperate demand.” Lease rates in London, normally a fraction of a percent, “jumped up over 39%.” The picture he painted was one of panic beneath the surface.
“In London they have a 140 million ounce float, yet they’re trading 600 million ounces a day… There’s over two billion ounces in paper claims out there on a float of 140 million.”
In Schectman’s view, London is the epicenter of a quiet crisis, where years of “rehypothecation”—multiple claims on the same bars—are being exposed. “It’s being called under the carpet,” he warned.
Pressed on what happens when this paper structure breaks, he compared it to a run on a bank. When short sellers can’t find metal to deliver, and borrowing costs soar, margin calls start hitting.
“You’re beginning to see margin calls… they’re not able to get the silver to cover their position,” he said. “That’s when things begin to get very, very, very interesting.”
In the short term, he acknowledged, the chaos could create sharp swings—“liquidations and survival-driven selling”—but he sees that as temporary. “Once forced selling ends, the physical scarcity starts to dominate and silver sustains its higher prices $50 plus.” In the long run, he sees this as a system reset: “If confidence in this paper system collapses, a structural repricing of silver begins.”
Schectman doesn’t just lean on sentiment. He draws on chart analysis to argue that the market structure itself supports much higher prices. Describing a multi-decade “double cup and handle” formation stretching back to the 1980s, he claimed that silver’s breakout above $50 could technically project prices as high as $96.
“You take the distance from the bottom… from 50 to 4… and you add it to the top… the next target… is $96,” he explained.
Still, he conceded that nothing moves in a straight line. “There will be volatility,” he said, but he believes that each pullback will merely reset the stage for a higher base.
When the conversation turned macro, Schectman zoomed out. To him, this isn’t just about silver—it’s about the U.S. dollar and a global shift away from Western financial dominance.
“It’s not gold and silver going higher. It is the dollar losing ground and losing value,” he said, describing the currency as “a melting ice cube.”
He linked that decline to what he sees as an intentional policy effort to devalue the dollar in order to bring back U.S. manufacturing. Referencing former Trump adviser Judy Shelton and market analyst Luke Gromen, he speculated that policymakers may even be planning to quietly peg long-term U.S. Treasury debt to gold.
“If they back the back end of the Treasury market with gold and let gold slowly… go higher… you’re doing it to let the dollar devalue,” he said. “The biggest money in the world… the institutional traders who are standing for delivery left and right… they know what’s coming.”
Schectman’s thesis, then, is that the metals rally is not a speculative mania but a symptom of a global monetary adjustment. “This is the dollar devaluation trade,” he said flatly.
When asked how these stresses are playing out in his business, Schectman’s answer was direct: premiums are exploding and spreads are widening. He pointed to the backwardation gap as evidence of dealers’ exposure.
“We were about a $3 spread between the futures price and the spot price,” he said. “For dealers who have to buy metal at X, they can’t hedge it anywhere near X… So you’re exposed.”
That exposure is showing up in retail pricing. “Every major dealer in America right now is north of six, seven, eight an ounce over spot… just like that,” he said of Silver Eagle coins. On gold, he added, “Our cost on Gold Buffaloes is north of $200 over spot before we make a penny.”
He blames much of this on bottlenecks at the U.S. Mint, which he calls “the model of inefficiency,” unable to produce enough supply when demand spikes. But he also says premiums reflect a deeper issue—the public’s growing insistence on physical metal rather than paper exposure.
Schectman was even harsher when asked about exchange-traded funds like SLV and GLD.
“SLV and GLD… read pages 6 through 12 titled risk factors,” he warned, calling them “a scam” in essence. “I wouldn’t put my money in to save my life.”
[QTR: Pay attention here. I would also not use SLV or GLD to get long-term exposure to gold and silver. I would own the Sprott funds instead, if I needed to own something other than physical.]
He drew a bright line between paper and physical ownership.
“You can own physical metal within your IRA… you can say send me my metal… you can’t ever take possession of GLD and SLV.”
That distinction—between real custody and paper claims—runs through his entire worldview. “If you don’t hold it, you don’t really have it,” he repeated.
Schectman also noted a dramatic shift in customer behavior.
“We’re seeing nothing in the way of selling,” he said. “The big money has been doing this now for the last six months.”
Institutional investors, he claims, have been aggressively buying gold and silver, while wholesalers and refiners, lulled by a year of low demand, are now scrambling to catch up. “It will go from an environment of high prices… to people saying, ‘I can’t get it easily. It’s disappearing.’ And just like that, it will disappear.”
When asked about supply constraints, he pointed to both natural and industrial limits. Silver, he said, is being mined less each year, and only a fraction comes from dedicated silver mines. At the same time, industrial demand—from solar panels to electric vehicles—is surging.
“On top of an expansion in demand, you have a decrease,” he said. “It’s disappearing in nature.”
That dual squeeze makes silver, in his words, “a once-in-a-generation… shift into an asset that has been controlled by the West forever on leverage futures contracts.”
When asked if it was “too late” for new buyers, Schectman was pragmatic. He doesn’t dismiss the possibility of a pullback, but he argues that waiting for the perfect entry is risky.
“Cost average. Cost average is the only way to smooth out the uncertainty curve,” he said.
He recommends investors “build a core position first, then keep averaging,” suggesting pre-1965 U.S. coins—so-called “constitutional silver”—as “the best value by far… not even close really.” For buyers who prefer one-ounce coins, he notes that Maples, Britannias, Kangaroos, Philharmonics, and Krugerrands currently offer better value than Silver Eagles, though the Eagles have stronger liquidity.
He also cautioned against rotating out of silver into gold just yet.
“It’s not time to trade your silver for gold yet,”
he said, though he added that “gold’s going to go higher than anyone thinks possible.”
Schectman also drew a line between what the public is doing and what the insiders are doing. Retail investors, he noted, are still heavily exposed to stocks and options, while “the big money” is quietly moving into hard assets. “The public is all loaded into the equity market,” he said, “and the big money is leaving… standing for delivery on physical metal.”
In his mind, that divergence tells the story. The institutions aren’t chasing speculation—they’re moving to safety. And individuals, he argues, should follow. The goal isn’t short-term profit, it’s preservation.
“Buying gold and silver right now is not—you’re not buying it to get wealthy. You’re buying it because it is wealth.”
That line captures the ethos behind his warnings. Schectman sees backwardation, soaring lease rates, and a widening gap between physical and paper prices as signs that a generational shift is underway. He believes policy winds are turning toward deliberate dollar devaluation and that the market, quietly but surely, is repricing real assets accordingly. Whether one agrees with his interpretation or not, the conditions he describes—spot over futures, spiking premiums, and delivery stress—fit the profile of a market where confidence in paper promises is giving way to the demand for something tangible.
“The rush for gold and silver is real,” he concluded. “It’s intensifying.”
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After Reported “Shouting Match”, Zelensky & Trump Agree Battlelines Should Be Frozen Before Final Peace Can Be Brokered
Update (1430ET): In what appears to be yet another confirmation of our ‘Trump Proximity Theory’, The FT reports that after President Trump’s lengthy call with Russian President Putin, the American leader urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms for ending its war in a volatile White House meeting on Friday, warning that Putin had said he would “destroy” Ukraine if it did not agree.
The FT further noted that, according to people familiar with the matter, the meeting between the US and Ukrainian presidents descended many times into a “shouting match”, with Trump “cursing all the time.”
The ‘people familiar’ reportedly added that the US president tossed aside maps of the frontline in Ukraine, insisted Zelenskyy surrender the entire Donbas region to Putin, and repeatedly echoed talking points the Russian leader had made in their call a day earlier.
Additionally, The FT reports that according to a European official with knowledge of the meeting, Trump told Zelenskyy that the Ukrainian leader needed to cut a deal or face destruction.
The official said that Trump told Zelenskyy he was losing the war, warning: “If [Putin] wants it, he will destroy you.”
Three other European officials briefed on the White House discussions confirmed that Trump had spent much of the meeting lecturing Zelenskyy, repeating Putin’s arguments about the conflict and urging him to accept the Russian proposal.
“Zelenskyy was very negative” following the meeting, according to one of the officials, adding that European leaders were “not optimistic but pragmatic with planning next steps”.
Trump told Fox News on Sunday that he was confident about securing an end to the conflict, and added that Putin is “going to take something, he’s won certain property”.
However, despite The FT’s source claiming the acrimony was heavy, Ukraine ultimately managed (as we detailed earlier – below) to swing Trump back to endorsing a freeze of the current front lines.
* * *
Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky has expressed agreement with President Trump on Sunday that the war should be frozen along current battle lines, and only then can comprehensive peace talks begin.
Zelensky said he’s ready to strike peace, but doubted that Putin is willing, saying “I’m not sure that Putin is ready to just finish this war” and that a ceasefire is vital before negotiations can start.
The Kremlin has at every turn rejected the idea of a ‘temporary’ truce, and has said it will accept nothing less than a comprehensive deal which tackles all the issues, for a permanent peace.
“President Trump is right: We have to stop where we are,” Zelensky had earlier said after meeting Trump at the White House, for his third visit there since January.
“The meeting with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine was very interesting, and cordial, but I told him, as I likewise strongly suggested to President Putin, that it is time to stop the killing, and make a DEAL!” Trump wrote on Truth Social of the visit.
“Enough blood has been shed, with property lines being defined by War and Guts. They should stop where they are. Let both claim Victory, let History decide!” Trump wrote.
“No more shooting, no more Death, no more vast and unsustainable sums of money spent. This is a War that would have never started if I were President. Thousands of people being slaughtered each and every week — NO MORE, GO HOME TO YOUR FAMILIES IN PEACE!” – the message stated further.
Zelensky failed to persuade Trump to send Tomahawks, as the White House clearly wants to avoid this escalation.
In the meantime, a report in The Wall Street Journal paints a picture of Trump putting more pressure on the Ukrainian side rather than the Russian side:
Even within the administration, officials have taken note of Trump’s hesitation to push Putin, who so far has shown little interest in concessions needed to make a deal. The White House has put more pressure on Kyiv than on Moscow, one administration official noted.
“There are tools to put more pressure on the Russians economically and militarily—and we’re not using them,” said Daniel Fried, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state for Europe.
Yet there’s still been no apparent pressure put on Zelensky to cede territory in the east, which remains a key compromise that Moscow is demanding. This pressure might be happening behind the scenes, but has not been a public talking point of the US administration.
Zelensky accepts defeat after Trump meet? | #WATCH
After meeting at the White House, Zelensky endorsed Trump’s proposal to “stop where we are,” calling it a first step toward “real peace” and stressing the need to end Russian aggression.
But even NATO allies in Europe have time and again expressed they will never recognize Russian sovereignty over Crimea, much less the Donbass. But all the while, Russian forces have continued making gains in the east along the front lines, even pushing into a central oblast of late.
