Fed Announces Minimum Rate Hike, Spooked by War Impact

By Mike Gleason

Precious metals markets sold off ahead of this week’s Federal Reserve policy meeting. But after Fed officials announced their rate hike, prices recovered somewhat.

Another market that has gone haywire is nickel. It’s not a metal that typically drives headlines, but prices swung so violently in futures markets that trading had to be halted for the first time in 24 years.

Nickel prices doubled in matter of hours last week. An institutional trader had placed big bets that nickel prices would fall and was forced to cover, or buy back, his short positions. An epic short squeeze ensued, followed by a massive sell-off this week.

Some precious metals analysts point to the potential for a similar short squeeze to play out in silver. The paper silver market is heavily shorted by leveraged institutional traders who have no intention or desire to deliver physical metal. In the event of a scramble for scarce supplies of silver, futures markets could become completely unhinged.

In other news, the big question on investors’ minds is how the Federal Reserve’s newly launched rate hiking campaign will impact markets.

On Wednesday, the Fed bumped up its benchmark interest rate by a quarter point, as expected. Both equity and precious metals markets responded positively.

5-Count Felon JPMorgan Is at the Center of a New, Multi-Billion Dollar Trading Scandal

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: March 15, 2022 ~

Jamie Dimon Sits in Front of Trading Monitor in his Office (Source -- 60 Minutes Interview, November 10, 2019)

JPMorgan Chairman and CEO, Jamie Dimon, Sits in Front of Trading Monitor in his Office (Source — 60 Minutes Interview, November 10, 2019)

Traders who feel they were robbed of their profits trading nickel last week at the London Metal Exchange (LME) have taken to Twitter to verbally accuse the LME of favoring their “cronies” and behaving like “slime balls.”

Lining up as crony suspect Number 1 are units of JPMorgan Chase who, together, hold the largest number of Class B shares in the London Metal Exchange than any other member. Those units are J.P. Morgan Markets Limited with 25,000 shares; J.P. Morgan Metals Limited with 19,100 shares; and J.P. Morgan Securities with 25,000 shares for a total of 69,100 Class B shares, according to a listing of shareholders on the LME’s website.

Bitcoin Weighed Down by Resistance; Support at $35K-$37K

By Damanick Dantes

Bitcoin (BTC) continues to struggle within a choppy trading range between $37,000 and $45,000. The cryptocurrency is roughly flat over the past week, although the loss of upside momentum could keep sellers active over the short-term.

The downward sloping 100-day moving average, currently at $43,300, has weighed on price action over the past few months. That indicates a downtrend, evidenced by a series of lower price highs since November.

While the downtrend has stabilized within a tight trading range, a lower price high from March 2 indicates limited upside beyond $46,000.

Insane Globalists Collapsing World Economy – Martin Armstrong

In his USAWatchdog.com interview just two weeks ago, legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong said, The New World Order’s so-called ‘Great Reset’ plan for humanity is ‘falling apart,’ and pointed out, “They are basically desperate at this stage.  I don’t think they anticipated the amount of resistance they are getting.”

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is enormous resistance to the New World Order plans.  Armstrong, who has new data from his Socrates computer analysis, is out with a fresh critical update.  Armstrong explains, “It’s just total insanity.  They are, really at this stage, completely collapsing the world economy.  You have Apple and all these companies; there are over 300 American companies in Russia.  Their assets are going to be seized. 

Prepare for a New Source of Inflation

By Mike Barrett

On December 30, 2021, an entire subdivision in Boulder County, Colorado was incinerated...

What we now know as the Marshall Fire ‒ the most destructive wildfire in Colorado history ‒ was the culprit.

At a news conference during the catastrophe, Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle estimated that the fire was engulfing "football field lengths of land in seconds"... The Sagamore subdivision of 171 homes in the town of Superior (about 25 miles northwest of Denver) was completely destroyed.

In all, 1,100-plus homes across Boulder County were turned to ash, including 9% of Superior's housing stock.

Climate Adaptation Center CEO Robert Bunting, a longtime resident of the area, says there were two catalysts. First, the extended drought gripping the western U.S. "has [had] no parallel in the

Prepare for Higher Energy Prices as the War in Ukraine Wages

By Andrey Dashkov, analyst, Casey Research

The war in Ukraine has begun.

The markets are reacting to the violence as they tend to do… commodities are rising, and stocks are volatile.

Just as the world is recovering from the pandemic, it’s up for another turbulent year.

And as someone who grew up and lived a large part of my life in Eastern Europe, Dave Forest asked me to share my perspective on what’s happening in Ukraine right now.

In short, prepare for higher oil and natural gas prices… and even more inflation in the coming months…

The War in Ukraine to Push Energy Prices Higher

Russia is determined to re-establish itself as a regional power… and it’s unlikely this situation will change soon, or for the better.

That’s because the Russian government isn’t prioritizing economic considerations.

Even the Fed’s Lowball Inflation Measure Goes WOOSH: Fodder for 50-Basis-Point Rate Hike in March

The most reckless Fed ever is still just watching – and fueling – the consequences of 23 months of policy errors as the Inflation Monster gets bigger and bigger.

By Wolf Richter for WOLF STREET.

The Fed’s official yardstick for inflation, the “core PCE” price index, which excludes food and energy and is the lowest lowball inflation measure the US government produces and which understates actual inflation more than any other inflation measure, spiked by another 0.5% in January from December, and by 5.2% year-over-year, the worst inflation spike since April 1983, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis today.

The Fed’s official and inexplicable inflation target is 2%, as measured by this lowest lowball inflation measure. And now even this lowball measure is 2.6 times the Fed’s target:

Commodities, Wars and Elections in 2022

As important as technology and drill results are…

Jurisdictional risk is one of the most important factors to watch in your stock portfolio.

I have discussed this in detail with the +SWAP Line vs. -SWAP Line Nation concept.

Few analysts truly account for it in their models. Why?

Most of the time they are trying to “please” the company and institutional salesmen with favorable write-ups rather than buying stock personally.

For example, do you think a North American publicly listed company with an asset in Russia or Turkey has the same discount rate as an asset in Nevada?

Well, believe it or not, that is the case…

With almost every published analyst from the big banks applying the same 5% discount rate for a project in Russia or Turkey as in Nevada.

Flat out—that’s just insane.

You don’t need an advanced degree in math to know that analysis is wrong.

Having traveled around the globe, worn bulletproof vests, rode in armored cars, and most importantly invest my own money at the same time and price as my research…

I can assure you I take jurisdictional risk more seriously than any other analyst or banker.