Money

In less than one year, 46 trillion dollars in financial wealth has been wiped out.  If that isn’t a “crash”, how would you define one?  Since last November, stocks and bonds have been plunging all over the globe.  When there is a good day like we saw on Monday, sometimes that can fool us into thinking that everything is going to be okay.  But in order to understand what is really going on we need to step back and look at the bigger picture.  And when we look at the bigger picture, it becomes exceedingly clear that we are in the midst of a historic worldwide market crash.  According to Bank of America, a whopping 46.1 trillion dollars in financial wealth has already been wiped out since last November…

It’s been a tough year for investors, with global stock and bond markets erasing $46.1 trillion in market value since November 2021, according to Bank of America.

The massive drawdown has led to forced liquidations on Wall Street, the bank’s chief investment strategist Michael Hartnett said in a Friday note, highlighting the recent break below 2018 support in the NYSE Composite Index.

When I first came across that number I could hardly believe it.

But it is accurate.

Stocks have been falling and falling and falling, and Bank of America is warning that this is one of the worst global bond market crashes that we have ever seen…

Analysts at BofA liken it to going “Cold Turkey” and blame it for causing the third “Great Bond Bear Market.”

They calculate the 20% plus losses suffered by government debt investors over the last year are now a par with the post World War I and II years of 1920 and 1949, and the Great Depression rout of 1931.

The combined collapse in global stock and bond markets means global market capitalisation has been slashed by over $46 trillion.

That is an amount of money that is difficult to comprehend.

The total value of all goods and services produced in the United States last year was approximately 23 trillion dollars.

So we are talking about an amount of money that is roughly twice as large as our GDP for an entire year.

When the Federal Reserve and other central banks around the world took the punch bowl away, it was obvious that something like this would happen.

Central bank intervention pushed global financial markets to absolutely absurd levels, and there was no way that they could remain there once the artificial support was removed.

Here in the United States, all of the major stock indexes have fallen for three quarters in a row, and tech stocks have been leading the way down…

The S&P 500 Index closed on Friday at 3,586, down 25.6% from its intraday high on January 3, and where it had first been in November 2020.

The Russell 2000, which tracks small-cap stocks, is down 31.8% from its high on November 5, having thereby maintained its function as early warning signal.

The Nasdaq closed at 10,576, down 34.8% from its intraday high on November 22, the very day Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella dumped 50.2% of his Microsoft stock in a bunch of frenzied trades, totaling $285 million. On the list of best-timed insider trades ever, he must be at the very top. Since then, Microsoft shares have plunged 33.4%, to $232.90, the lowest closing price since March 2021.

As I discussed a few days ago, the wealthiest tech tycoons have collectively lost 315 billion dollars over the past year.

Ouch.

The Federal Reserve giveth and the Federal Reserve taketh away.

The same thing is true for the housing market.  Fed policies created the largest housing bubble in our history, but now that bubble is bursting.

In fact, it is being reported that we just witnessed “the largest single-month price declines” since the last financial crisis…

… today Black Knight confirmed that the US housing market has turned decidedly ugly with the two biggest monthly declines since the global financial crisis.

According to a Monday report from mortgage-data provider, median home prices fell 0.98% in August from a month earlier, following a 1.05% drop in July.

The two periods marked the largest monthly declines since January 2009. In fact, at the current pace of declines, we may soon see a record drop in home prices, surpassing the largest historical slide hit during the global financial crisis.

The report noted that July and August 2022 mark the largest single-month price declines seen since January 2009 and rank among the eight largest on record.

If the Federal Reserve does not reduce rates, things will soon get really, really ugly for the housing market.

Unfortunately, the Fed is actually going to keep raising rates because Fed officials are scared to death of the raging inflation crisis that they originally helped to create.

Thanks to the Fed, grocery prices were up 13.5 percent in August…

We’ve seen the higher prices at the grocery store, and it looks like they won’t be coming down anytime soon.

New government data shows grocery prices climbed 13.5% in August from the year before. That’s the highest annual increase since March 1979.

Food producers say the surge is a result of paying higher prices for labor and packaging materials. They also point to extreme weather, disease and supply issues.

As long as we keep seeing numbers like that, the Fed is going to keep raising rates.

And the price of gasoline just hit another all-time record high in Los Angeles…

Gas prices hit a record high in Los Angeles County of $6.466 per gallon on Monday morning, soaring past the previous record set during the nationwide price surge this past spring.

If you think that is bad, just wait until California residents are paying 10 dollars a gallon for gasoline.

The cost of living has become incredibly oppressive, and one recent survey found that 73 percent of Americans believe that their incomes are “falling behind inflation”…

Scott Rasmussen’s Number of the Day survey results on Ballotpedia also found that 73% of Americans say that over the past year, their income has been falling behind inflation. The survey’s sample size was 1,200 registered voters, and it was conducted online by pollster Scott Rasmussen on Sept. 15-17. The margin of error for the full sample is +/- 2.8 percentage points.

Until inflation is under control, the Fed is going to keep raising rates.

And inflation is not likely to be under control any time soon, because the vast majority of U.S. manufacturers are planning more price increases in 2023…

In a new Forbes/Xometry/John Zogby Strategies survey shared with Secrets about the impact of inflation and the continued supply chain crisis under President Biden, 87% of manufacturing CEOs said they planned to increase prices in 2023.

Many cited the ongoing supply chain crisis, problems getting materials from China, and sellers taking advantage of the economic mess to jack up prices.

“Our margins are under pressure as costs creep up throughout the supply-chain network,” one CEO told the poll conducted by Jeremy Zogby, the managing partner of John Zogby Strategies.

So the Federal Reserve will not be riding to the rescue of the financial markets this time around.

Fed officials are absolutely petrified of high inflation, and so rates will continue to go up.

And that means that this financial bubble will continue to implode.  As Eric Peters has aptly noted, market crashes can take a long time to fully play out…

“It’s important to remember that the bursting of a bubble takes a long time to play out. It may feel fast and chaotic at various points in the process, but it isn’t really. Look at 2008. Everyone thinks of Lehman’s Bankruptcy on September 15, 2008, as the big catalyst for that crisis, but the S&P 500 had peaked the previous November. Bear Sterns failed on March 13th, 2008. From the Friday before Lehman’s bankruptcy to the end of that month, the S&P was only down 7%. The real weakness was in October with a local low in November.”

The final bottom wasn’t until March of the next year. “The bubble was bursting before Lehman Brothers.” That was just the large cathartic event that caught our attention, ignited our imagination. “And even after that it took months for the market to bottom. Markets don’t clear imbalances instantaneously. So we should be preparing ourselves for a marathon, not a sprint.”

We are still only in the very early chapters of this story.

As I have been relentlessly warning my readers, things are going to eventually get really, really bad.

The Federal Reserve and other central banks flooded the global financial system with money, and so now we are facing a horrific worldwide inflation crisis.

They are attempting to fix things by rapidly raising rates, but that is causing absolutely enormous problems for global financial markets.

This isn’t going to end well, and we have finally gotten to a point where this should be exceedingly obvious to everyone.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

The parallels between 2008 and 2022 just keep getting stronger.  14 years ago, the collapse of Lehman Brothers sent a massive wave of panic through global financial markets and is widely considered to be the key event that plunged us into a horrifying financial crisis that we still talk about to this day.  Well, now an even larger bank appears to be on the brink of collapse, and analysts all over the world are deeply concerned about what that will mean for the global financial system if it does fail.

Right now, Credit Suisse is one of the most important banks in the entire world.  If you are not familiar with Credit Suisse, the following is some good background information that comes from Wikipedia…

Credit Suisse Group AG is a global investment bank and financial services firm founded and based in Switzerland. Headquartered in Zürich, it maintains offices in all major financial centers around the world and is one of the nine global “Bulge Bracket” banks providing services in investment banking, private banking, asset management, and shared services. It is known for strict bank–client confidentiality and banking secrecy. The Financial Stability Board considers it to be a global systemically important bank. Credit Suisse is also primary dealer and Forex counterparty of the FED .

Credit Suisse is truly one of the central hubs of the entire international banking system.

If it were to fail, the ripple effects would be felt very deeply in literally every nation on the planet.

Unfortunately, it is being reported that Credit Suisse could be “on the verge of collapse” and we are being warned that if it does collapse it could cause “a shock similar to that caused by the bankruptcy of the U.S. bank Lehman Brothers in September 2008”…

Speculation surrounding the future of the Swiss banking giant has been going on for several months in the markets, in business and political circles, as well as on social networks.

The No. 2 Swiss bank and one of the largest banks in the world is in deep trouble and is currently fighting for its survival. A negative outcome is likely to cause a shock similar to that caused by the bankruptcy of the U.S. bank Lehman Brothers in September 2008. This event triggered one of the most serious financial and economic crises since the Great Depression.

When Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, it had 639 billion dollars in assets.

In late 2022, Credit Suisse currently has 1.5 trillion dollars of assets under management.

pic.twitter.com/mpAoIj7zdI

— SG (@GhoshSubhag) October 2, 2022

The collapse of Credit Suisse would create a wave of panic that would be unlike anything that we have seen since the last financial crisis.

But new CEO Ulrich Koerner insists that everything is just fine…

There has been plenty of movement around Credit Suisse over the weekend. On Friday, CEO Ulrich Koerner sent around a memo saying that the bank had a “strong capital base and liquidity position”, whilst senior executives spent their weekend doing their best to reassure large clients, counterparties and investors, according to the Financial Times.

The memo from the CEO also noted that the bank was at a “critical moment” as it prepares for a restructuring, the details of which are the be revealed on October 27. Expectations are that some 5000 jobs could be cut, with assets sold off. Some analysts are saying it won’t be enough, however. According to a Bloomberg report, Credit Suisse is estimated to need a further $4 billion Swiss francs even after asset sales, to fund the restructuring, with a capital raise touted as the most likely option.

Are the markets buying what Koerner is selling?

Nope.

Credit Suisse credit default swaps just keep going the wrong direction, and that means that investors are starting to get really, really nervous…

Credit Suisse’s Credit Default Swaps, or CDS, a derivative instrument that allows an investor to swap their credit risk with another investor, surged on Friday, reflecting the market perception of increasing risk. It is now approaching the highs seen during the 2008 financial crisis, which saw U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers go bankrupt.

Houston we have a problem. Market cap of $CS is now a rounding error. 35x leverage. This and Deutsche Bank…a canary in coal mine.

CDS on Credit Suisse now at GFC highs. #btc pic.twitter.com/cVTOavkBv2

— FOSS – Lehman CDS at 9bps in ’06, 🇨🇦 now at 41 (@FossGregfoss) September 30, 2022

At this point, just about everyone can smell blood.

And it certainly isn’t going to take much to set off widespread hysteria.

Formal Announcement: pic.twitter.com/Pmygv369gq

— Credit Suisse Risk Department (@RammityCap) October 1, 2022

This is such an ominous time for Europe.  The EU is heading into the worst energy crisis that it has ever experienced, the bond market is starting to go bonkers, and now giant financial institutions such as Credit Suisse are being greatly shaken.

Martin Armstrong was recently interviewed by Greg Hunter, and he boldly declared that a “crisis in banking will start in Europe”…

So, could Europe suck the rest of the world down the tubes? Armstrong says, “Oh, absolutely. Europe is the problem. . . . The crisis in banking will start in Europe. . . . The debt is collapsing. They have no way to sustain themselves. The debt market over there is undermining the stability of all the banks. You have to understand that reserves are tied to government debt, and this is the perfect storm. Yes, the (U.S.) stock market will go down short term. We are not facing a 1929 event or a 90% fall here. . . . Europeans, probably by January of 2023, as this crisis in Ukraine escalates, anybody with half a brain is going to take whatever money they have and get it over here.”

I am not as optimistic about U.S. financial markets as Armstrong seems to be.

Yes, Europe is currently in worse shape, but things are starting to unravel quite rapidly here too.

In fact, we just witnessed the worst month for U.S. stocks since the very early days of the pandemic…

September was a horrible month for stocks. The Dow fell nearly 9%, its worst monthly drop since March 2020, when pandemic lockdowns started in the United States. The index ended Friday deeply in the red, too.

Overall, this is the very first time that the Dow Jones Industrial Average has been down for three quarters in a row since 2015.

And it is the very first time that the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq have been down for three quarters in a row since 2009.

A lot of people out there still seem to think that things will “return to normal” very soon, and unfortunately all of those people are very wrong.

The truth is that we are right on the precipice of the sort of historic meltdown that I have been relentlessly warning was coming.

Our leaders kicked the can down the road for a long time, but now they are running out of road.

A day of reckoning has arrived for Europe, and soon a day of reckoning will arrive for us as well.

So buckle your seatbelts, because we are in for a very bumpy ride.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

I don’t know if I have the words to describe what we have just seen.  Summer just ended, and within one week we have already witnessed the most costly natural disaster in the entire history of the United States.  There are some areas along the west coast of Florida that have literally been destroyed.  Some have compared the devastation to the dropping of an atomic bomb, and that is not an exaggeration at all.  The state of Florida has never experienced a storm quite like this before, and recovery is going to be measured in years.

When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005, it was a Category 3 storm.

Hurricane Ian had maximum sustained wind speeds of 155 mph, and that put it just 2 mph short of being a Category 5 storm.

But the high winds weren’t what made Ian so horrible.

What made Ian so horrible was the storm surge.  Giant walls of water picked up cars, boats, telephone poles and palm trees and tossed them around like toys.  According to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, what we just witnessed was a “500-year flooding event”…

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said the storm caused a “500-year flooding event” and said Coast Guard helicopters were plucking trapped residents from the roofs of homes. Communities across the state were or will be swamped by the overwhelming waters, he said.

“The impacts of this storm are historic and the damage that has been done is historic,” DeSantis said. “We’ve never seen a flood event like this, we’ve never seen a storm surge of this magnitude.”

This storm greatly strengthened right before it made landfall, and a lot of people were caught off guard by that.

It was already too late when many finally realized that they should evacuate, and it appears that there was a “substantial loss of life” as a result…

“This could be the deadliest hurricane in Florida history,” Biden said after a briefing at FEMA emergency management headquarters in Washington.

He said the numbers “are still unclear, but we’re hearing reports of what may be substantial loss of life.”

In fact, Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno says that “the fatalities are in the hundreds”…

“This is a life-changing event for all of us,” Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno told “Good Morning America.”

“I don’t have confirmed numbers — I definitely know the fatalities are in the hundreds,” he added.

“So far, confirmed in the hundreds,” he said, noting that conditions were too dire for his officers and other rescuers to get a true sense of the disaster.

Was he referring to just his county or the state as a whole?

Someone should ask him that question.

This is truly a historic tragedy, but some have decided that all of this chaos makes it the perfect time for a crime spree…

Amid the chaos of Hurricane Ian, looting and other crimes have been committed in Lee County.

In coordination with Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno, County Commission, city managers and city councils, Dejarlais announced a 6 p.m. curfew for Lee County, which will be in place until further notice.

“To be sure, and I feel safe relaying this in on behalf of law enforcement, there’s going to be a zero-tolerance policy for looting and violence in this town,” Dejarlais said.

I suppose that we shouldn’t be surprised that looting is happening.

Every time there is some sort of a major disaster, this is what some of us do.

It truly is disgusting.

This is a time when everybody should be pulling together.  According to one estimate, the economic damage from this storm could be somewhere in the neighborhood of 260 billion dollars…

Experts expect the damages to cost up to $260 billion, though the clean-up efforts are currently unable to get underway as swathes of Florida remain underwater.

Prior to Hurricane Ian, the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history was Hurricane Katrina.

According to the GAO, Katina caused 170 billion dollars in damage…

Hurricanes Katrina, Sandy, Harvey, and Irma (selected hurricanes) caused costly damages and challenges for some populations in affected communities. In these communities, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) estimated the cost of damages to be approximately $170 billion for Katrina, $74 billion for Sandy, $131 billion for Harvey, and $52 billion for Irma. These estimates include the value of damages to residential, commercial, and government or municipal buildings; material assets within the buildings; business interruption; vehicles and boats; offshore energy platforms; public infrastructure; and agricultural assets.

At this point, it appears that Katrina has been knocked out of the top spot.

Right at the end of September 2022, we have witnessed the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history by a wide margin.

And Ian is not done yet.

As I write this article, the city of Charleston is “bracing for a direct hit” very early on Friday morning…

Charleston is bracing for a direct hit from Hurricane Ian with storm surges of up to 7ft as it hurtles towards the historic city after barreling through Florida leaving swathes of the state decimated and at least 13 dead.

Monster tempest Ian has recharged from a tropical storm back into a Category 1 hurricane as it angles northwards towards South Carolina to pummel the state Friday morning, as well as neighboring North Carolina and Georgia.

Landfall in Charleston is expected around 8am on Friday, with the surrounding states also being issued with several extreme weather warnings.

When the damage to Charleston is factored in, the total economic damage from this storm could easily surpass 300 billion dollars.

This is not something that we are going to be able to bounce back from easily.

For years, I have been warning that unprecedented natural disasters would be headed our way.

Now it is happening right in front of our eyes.

The summer is over, the fall is here, and winter is coming.

We have been through so much already, but the rest of 2022 is inevitably going to have even more surprises for us.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

For the good of humanity, this has got to stop.  The United States and Russia both keep raising the stakes, and if we keep repeating this cycle it will end with a nuclear war that could ultimately result in billions of deaths.  Unfortunately, leaders on both sides do not seem interested in peace at this point.  The votes that Russia just conducted in four disputed territories were inevitably going to raise tensions even higher.  Of course the western powers have been greatly escalating matters themselves.  Over the past couple of months, NATO has gotten far more deeply involved in the conflict in Ukraine, and now the war is starting to spread beyond Ukrainian borders.

Everyone agrees that the damage caused to the Nord Stream pipeline system was an act of sabotage.  As I discussed yesterday, an explosion that registered 1.9 on the Richter scale was followed by a second explosion that registered 2.3 on the Richter scale.  These explosions were absolutely huge, and that suggests that this was a military operation.

Many in the western world are blaming Russia for the sabotage, but why would they blow up pipelines that they spent so much time and energy constructing and that have enabled them to make giant mountains of money selling natural gas to Europe?

The Russians have already been punishing the Europeans by restricting the flow of gas through those pipelines.  There was certainly no need to blow them up.

If it is ultimately proven that the Russians did this, it would be one of the stupidest geopolitical moves that I have ever seen.

Of course there is someone else that could have done it.

On Friday, September 23rd the following statement was posted on the official White House website…

The United States will never recognize Ukrainian territory as anything other than part of Ukraine. Russia’s referenda are a sham – a false pretext to try to annex parts of Ukraine by force in flagrant violation of international law, including the United Nations Charter. We will work with our allies and partners to impose additional swift and severe economic costs on Russia. The United States stands with our partners around the world – and with every nation that respects the core tenets of the UN charter – in rejecting whatever fabricated outcomes Russia will announce. We will continue to support the Ukrainian people and provide them with security assistance to help them defend themselves as they courageously resist Russia’s invasion.

So Joe Biden promised to impose “swift and severe economic costs on Russia” on Friday, and then on Monday both Nord Stream pipelines were blown up.

And by now you have probably already heard that Joe Biden threatened to attack the Nord Stream pipeline system before the war in Ukraine even started…

Pres. Biden: “If Russia invades…then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”

Reporter: “But how will you do that, exactly, since…the project is in Germany’s control?”

Biden: “I promise you, we will be able to do that.”

Biden had obviously been discussing this option with his advisers, and one of those advisers named Victoria Nuland also made a similar threat prior to the outbreak of the Ukrainian conflict…

“If Russia invades Ukraine, one way or another, Nord Stream 2 will not move forward.”

Some enterprising reporter needs to ask the Biden administration if they were responsible for the sabotage.

Of course they will probably deny it even if they ordered the attack.

But it is interesting to note that the Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group entered the Baltic Sea in early September…

The Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) with the embarked 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) concluded two successful training events with the Swedish Armed Forces and Standing NATO Maritime Group (SNMG) 1 while operating in the Baltic Sea, Sept. 4, 2022.

Unfortunately, the Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group didn’t leave the Baltic Sea area right away.

In fact, it is being reported that this task force didn’t actually leave the Baltic Sea until a few days ago…

The Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) and the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) have departed the Baltic Sea and are in the English Channel. The ARG includes USS Kearsarge (LHD-3), USS Arlington (LPD-24) and USS Gunston Hall (LSD-44). Kearsarge and Gunston Hall completed port calls in Gdynia and Gdansk, respectively, last week.

This would have given them plenty of time to plant explosives on the Nord Stream pipeline system if they were inclined to do so.

In addition, we have learned that the U.S. Navy was testing “the latest advancements in unmanned underwater vehicle mine hunting technology” in the Baltic Sea during the month of June…

A significant focus of BALTOPS every year is the demonstration of NATO mine hunting capabilities, and this year the U.S. Navy continues to use the exercise as an opportunity to test emerging technology, U.S. Naval Forces Europe-Africa Public Affairs said June 14.

In support of BALTOPS, U.S. Navy 6th Fleet partnered with U.S. Navy research and warfare centers to bring the latest advancements in unmanned underwater vehicle mine hunting technology to the Baltic Sea to demonstrate the vehicle’s effectiveness in operational scenarios.

Experimentation was conducted off the coast of Bornholm, Denmark, with participants from Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific, Naval Undersea Warfare Center Newport, and Mine Warfare Readiness and Effectiveness Measuring all under the direction of U.S. 6th Fleet Task Force 68.

Our Navy seems to have spent a lot of time in the Baltic Sea lately, eh?

Needless to say, the Russians are very angry about what has happened, and they have called an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council…

“Russia has requested an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council in connection with sabotage against two lines of the Nord Stream. We expect it to be held tomorrow,” Dmitry Polyanskiy, one of Russia’s top representatives at the U.N., wrote on his Telegram channel, according to a translation.

Shortly after issuing the statement early Wednesday, the French delegation to the U.N. confirmed to him that a meeting would indeed take place on Friday – a tacit acknowledgement of the panic that the explosions and subsequent leaks have caused.

It will be very interesting to see what transpires at that meeting.

Let us hope that the truth about all of this eventually comes out.

But even more, let us hope that cooler heads start to prevail and that leaders on both sides start to push for peace.

Because if both sides continue to hammer one another, at some point someone is going to cross a line that can never be uncrossed.

We are steamrolling toward nuclear war, and once the missiles start flying our world will never be the same again.

So I am not ashamed to say that I am pro-peace.

Nuclear war is a fate that is too horrible for words, but with each passing day our leaders are dragging us ever closer to such a conflict.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

If you think that nothing is happening, then you have not been paying attention.  Within the past 100 hours, there has been a mysterious attack on the Nord Stream gas pipeline system, two monster storms have threatened North America, NASA rammed a spacecraft into an asteroid in order to knock it off course, and our ongoing stock market crash reached a new level when the Dow Jones Industrial Average officially plunged into bear market territory on Monday.  I would say that is a pretty active 100 hours, but of course this is just the beginning.  I believe that global events will continue to accelerate during the months ahead, but meanwhile most of the general population is still assuming that things will eventually “return to normal” somehow.

We live during times when so many things are happening all at once that it is truly difficult to keep up with it all.

Personally, I fully expect things to get even more “interesting” now that summer is over, and we are certainly off to a flying start.  The following are 5 major events that have happened within the last 100 hours…

#1 A series of explosions has caused “unprecedented” damage to the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines…

The Nord Stream gas pipeline system endured “unprecedented” damage to three offshore lines on the bed of the Baltic Sea in one day, Nord Stream AG, the network’s operator, said on Tuesday.

The AG said it was impossible to estimate when the gas network system’s working capability would be restored.

“The destruction that occurred on the same day simultaneously on three strings of the offshore gas pipelines of the Nord Stream system is unprecedented. It is not yet possible to estimate the timing of the restoration of the gas transport infrastructure,” the operator told reporters.

As I discussed in a previous article, these pipelines are very well constructed and are extremely thick.  In order to damage them, very large explosions would be needed, and that is apparently exactly what happened.  In fact, the explosions that damaged these pipelines were so large that they actually registered on the Richter scale.  Many European officials are insisting that this could not have been an accident, and I agree with them.

But if this was not an accident, who was responsible?

#2 Fiona turned out to be a truly historic disaster for our neighbors to the north.  It violently slammed into Nova Scotia on Saturday, and we are being told that it was one of the most powerful storms in the entire history of Canada…

Fiona, the most powerful storm of this year’s Atlantic hurricane season, roared ashore in eastern Nova Scotia early Saturday as one of the strongest systems ever to hit the region, knocking out power, toppling trees and forcing residents to flee.

Across Nova Scotia, 414,000 households were without power, or about 80% of Nova Scotia Power’s customers. Thousands more were hit in neighboring areas as well.

This was definitely a “monster storm”, but it looks like an even bigger storm could be about to hit Florida…

#3 On Tuesday, Hurricane Ian strengthened into a “major Category 3 hurricane”, and forecasters are warning that it could actually turn into a Category 4 storm before it finally collides with the west coast of Florida on Wednesday…

The center of Ian could strengthen into a Category 4 hurricane as it continues to move over the Gulf, NBC News forecasters said.

Ian will continue to intensify today through Wednesday as it approaches the west coast of Florida on Wednesday “as an extremely dangerous major hurricane,” according to the National Hurricane Center.

Without a doubt, Ian is a very dangerous storm, and it has the potential to cause an immense amount of damage once it reaches shore.

#4 On Monday, NASA rammed a spacecraft into an asteroid for the first time in history in order to see if it could alter the trajectory of the giant space rock…

NASA’s DART mission slammed into Dimorphos, a smaller space rock circling a larger asteroid called Didymos, to see if it could throw off the orbit of a potential future asteroid that was threatening life on Earth. Scientists will be watching the Didymos system closely to see how much Dimorphos’ orbit actually changed – those results won’t come for at least another two months.

Confirmation of NASA’s successful planetary defense test came seconds after the 7:14 ET (00:14 BST) 14,000 mph collision, sparking applause among the ground team at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland. ‘Impact success!’ NASA tweeted after the DART spacecraft collided with the 560 foot asteroid, around 6.7 million miles away from Earth.

Is NASA conducting such a test for a specific reason?

If so, they would never actually admit it.

Personally, I have a feeling that this is a very important story that is far from over.

#5 U.S. stock prices continue to crash.

Unlike the crash of 2008, what we have witnessed so far in the fall of 2022 has been slow and steady.

But prices just keep going down.

On Monday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average officially entered bear market territory.

And then on Tuesday the Dow fell some more.

Overall, the Dow has now fallen 21.2 percent from the previous all-time high, the S&P 500 is down 24.3 percent from the record it set in January, and the Nasdaq has plummeted more than 33 percent from the peak that it hit last November.

The amount of wealth that has already been wiped out is absolutely staggering.  In fact, Forbes is reporting that the wealthiest tech tycoons have collectively lost 315 billion dollars over the past year…

Stock prices have dropped and inflation surged, making the members of The Forbes 400 list of the richest people in the U.S. a collective $500 billion poorer than last year. The wealthiest tech tycoons have taken the brunt of the beating: They have lost a combined $315 billion in net worth since the fall of 2021—accounting for nearly two thirds of the total drop in The Forbes 400’s wealth.

How would you feel if you and your friends lost 315 billion dollars in just one year?

Unfortunately, it appears that much more turmoil will be coming to Wall Street in the months ahead.

Economic problems are erupting all over the globe, more war is on the horizon, and our planet just keeps getting hit by one disaster after another.

It is almost as if we have entered some sort of a “perfect storm”, but most people out there still do not understand what is happening.

The strange events of the last 100 hours are not an anomaly.

We live at a time when really weird things are happening on a regular basis, and I have a feeling that the remainder of 2023 will bring us a lot more surprises.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

If you love to cook, this upcoming Thanksgiving may be a real challenge for you.  Thanks to a resurgence of the bird flu, supplies of turkey are getting tighter and tighter.  Sadly, the same thing is true for eggs.  And as you will see below, reduced milk production is sending the price of butter into the stratosphere.  Thanks to soaring prices, a traditional Thanksgiving dinner will be out of reach for millions of American families this year, and that is extremely unfortunate.  Of course all of this is happening in the context of a horrific global food crisis that is getting worse with each passing day.  Yes, things are bad now, but they will be significantly worse this time next year.

The bird flu pandemic that has killed tens of millions of our chickens and turkeys was supposed to go away during the hot summer months, but that didn’t happen.  And now that the weather is starting to get colder again, there has been a resurgence of the bird flu and this is “devastating egg and turkey operations in the heartland of the country”…

Turkeys are selling for record high prices ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday as a resurgence of bird flu wipes out supplies across the US.

Avian influenza is devastating egg and turkey operations in the heartland of the country. If just one bird gets it, the entire flock is culled in order to stop the spread. Millions of hens and turkeys have been killed in recent weeks. As a result, prices for turkey hens are nearly 30% higher than a year ago and 80% above pre-pandemic costs. Just as concerning are inventories of whole turkeys, which are the lowest going into the US winter holiday season since 2006. That means there will be little relief from inflation for Thanksgiving dinner.

In the months ahead, we could see tens of millions more chickens and turkeys get wiped out.

Egg prices have already tripled in 2022 and the price of turkey meat is up 60 percent.  Unfortunately, this is likely just the beginning…

Turkey hens are $1.82 a pound this week, according to Urner Barry, compared to $1.42 last year and $1.01 before the pandemic. Meanwhile, wholesale egg prices are at $3.62 a dozen as of Wednesday, the highest ever, up from a previous record of $3.45 a dozen set earlier this year, said John Brunnquell, chief executive officer of Egg Innovations, one of the biggest US producers of free-range eggs. Consumers have seen prices for eggs at grocery stores triple this year, while turkey meat rose a record-setting 60%, according to a Cobank report.

Meanwhile, supplies of butter are steadily getting tighter as well…

Lower milk production on U.S. dairy farms and labor shortages for processing plants have weighed on butter output for months, leaving the amount of butter in U.S. cold storage facilities at the end of July the lowest since 2017, according to the Agriculture Department.

Tight supplies have sent butter prices soaring at U.S. supermarkets, surpassing most other foods in the past year. U.S. grocery prices in August rose 13.5% during the past 12 months, the largest annual increase since 1979, according to the Labor Department. Butter outstripped those gains, rising 24.6% over the same period.

The trends that are driving up the price of butter aren’t going away any time soon, and so we are being warned to brace ourselves for “elevated” prices for the foreseeable future…

The forces at work in butter highlight the challenge of curtailing inflation. Economic pressures fueling high prices for livestock feed, labor shortages and other factors could persist, keeping prices for the kitchen staple elevated longer term.

To me, slathering a piece of warm bread with a huge chunk of butter is one of the best things about Thanksgiving.

And most of us will continue to buy butter no matter how high it goes.

But the truth is that rapidly rising food prices are forcing vast numbers of Americans to adjust their shopping habits.  Here is one example…

For Carol Ehrman, cooking is a joyful experience.

“I love to cook, it’s my favorite thing to do,” she said. She especially likes to cook Indian and Thai food, but stocking the spices and ingredients she needs for those dishes is no longer feasible. “When every ingredient has gone up, that adds up on the total bill,” she said.

“What used to cost us $250 to $300 … is now $400.” Ehrman, 60, and her husband, 65, rely on his social security income, and the increase was stretching their budget. “We just couldn’t do that.”

The global food crisis is starting to hit home for many ordinary Americans, and we need to understand that this crisis is still only in the very early chapters.

David Beasley is the head of the UN World Food Program, and he is actually using the word “hell” to describe what is potentially coming in 2023…

“It’s a perfect storm on top of a perfect storm,” Beasley said. “And with the fertilizer crisis we’re facing right now, with droughts, we’re facing a food pricing problem in 2022. This created havoc around the world.”

“If we don’t get on top of this quickly — and I don’t mean next year, I mean this year — you will have a food availability problem in 2023,” he said. “And that’s gonna be hell.”

The World Food Program keeps sounding the alarm, but very few of us in the western world seem to be taking those warnings very seriously.

People are literally dropping dead from starvation in some areas of the globe right now, and a new report that the WFP just released says that there are 19 “hotspots” where we could see a “huge loss of life” between October and January…

World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) are out with a new report outlining countries that “are either already starving or on the brink of disaster.”

WFP and FAO found 19 hunger hotspots worldwide, with most countries in Africa, the Middle East, and even some in Central America. They call for urgent humanitarian action between October 2022 and January 2023 to avoid “huge loss of life.”

Afghanistan, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, Yemen, and Haiti are labeled “hotspots of highest concern,” facing catastrophic hunger levels.

The sort of famines that we were warned about are already starting to happen right in front of our eyes, but most people simply will not care as long as they are not going hungry themselves.

What those people do not realize is that this global food crisis is going to continue to spread.

As supplies of food get tighter and tighter, prices will continue to soar and shortages will become more common.

We truly are in unprecedented territory, and the pain that is ahead will greatly shock all of the lemmings that just kept assuming that everything would work out just fine somehow.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

They know exactly what they are doing.  The “experts” that run the Federal Reserve know that if they dramatically hike interest rates it will cause countless American workers to lose their jobs and it will absolutely crush the housing market.  And even though those two things are already starting to happen, they just announced another massive rate hike.  If there was a school for central bankers, one of the very first things that they would teach you is that you should never, ever raise rates as an economy is plunging into a recession.  Every Fed official knows what has happened in the past when rates have been hiked at the beginning of an economic slowdown, but they are doing it anyway.  To call this “economic malpractice” would be a major understatement, and the American people should be deeply alarmed about what they are doing to us.

After everything that has already happened, it is hard to believe that Fed officials would continue to be so reckless.  On Wednesday, it was announced that rates would be raised by another 75 basis points…

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday raised its benchmark interest rate by 75 basis points for the third straight month as it struggles to bring scorching-hot inflation under control, a move that threatens to slow U.S. economic growth and exacerbate financial pain for millions of households and businesses.

The three-quarter percentage point hikes in June, July and September — the most aggressive series of increases since 1994 — underscore just how serious Fed officials are about tackling the inflation crisis after a string of alarming economic reports. Policymakers voted unanimously to approve the latest super-sized hike.

It was a unanimous vote.

There wasn’t even one dissenting voice.

Have they gone completely mad?

Wall Street certainly did not like this decision.  The Dow plunged hundreds of points immediately after it was announced…

The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 522.45 points, or 1.7%, to close at 30,183.78. The S&P 500 shed 1.71% to 3,789.93, and the Nasdaq Composite slumped 1.79% to 11,220.19.

The S&P ended Wednesday’s session down more than 10% in the past month and 21% off its 52-week high. Even before the rate decision, stocks were pricing in an aggressive tightening campaign by the Fed that could tip the economy into a recession.

For ages, the Fed coddled the financial markets, but now it is almost as if they don’t even care anymore.

Personally, I am far more concerned about what will happen to ordinary hard working Americans in the months ahead.  Even Jerome Powell is admitting that “an increase in unemployment” is likely because of what the Fed is doing…

“I think there’s a very high likelihood we will have a period of … much lower growth and it could give rise to an increase in unemployment,” he said.

Will that mean a recession?

“No one knows whether that process will lead to a recession or how significant a recession it will be,” Powell said. “I don’t know the odds.”

Actually, we are in a recession right now.

And Powell and his minions just made things a whole lot worse.

Even Democrats understand this.  After the rate hike was announced, Senator Elizabeth Warren went on Twitter and warned that “millions of Americans” could soon lose their jobs…

.@federalreserve’s Chair Powell just announced another extreme interest rate hike while forecasting higher unemployment. I’ve been warning that Chair Powell’s Fed would throw millions of Americans out of work — and I fear he’s already on the path to doing so.

This is one of the rare occasions when Elizabeth Warren is right on target.

As I have been documenting on my website for weeks, large numbers of Americans have already been getting laid off.

In fact, things are already so bad that even Facebook is trimming their numbers…

As growth stalls and competition intensifies, Facebook parent Meta has begun quietly cutting staff by reorganizing departments, while giving ‘reorganized’ employees a narrow window to apply for other roles within the company, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing current and former managers familiar with the matter.

By shuffling people around, the company achieves staffing cuts “while forestalling the mass issuance of pink slips.”

So why would the Fed choose to raise rates when layoffs are already beginning to spike?

Higher rates are also having a devastating impact on the housing market.

This week, we learned that sales of existing homes have now fallen for seven months in a row…

Home sales declined for the seventh month in a row in August as higher mortgage rates and stubbornly high prices pushed prospective buyers out of the market.

Sales of existing homes — which include single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops — were down 19.9% from a year ago and down 0.4% from July, according to a report from the National Association of Realtors.

Someone should start putting “Jerome Powell did this” stickers on for sale signs all over the nation.

Because this didn’t have to happen.

Now the housing market is already in a “deep recession”, and the Fed just keeps making things even worse…

The prolonged downturn in confidence shows the housing market has been “in a tailspin for the whole of this year,” according to Pantheon Macroeconomics chief economist Ian Shepherdson.

“Activity tracks mortgage applications with a lag, and the early September numbers are grim, even before the full hit from the rebound in mortgage rates in recent weeks works through,” Shepherdson said in a note to clients on Monday.

“In short, the housing market is in a deep recession, which is already hammering homebuilders and will soon depress housing-related retail sales,” he added.

The Fed seems determined to kill the economy.

But why?

Why would they do this?

One analyst that was just quoted by Fox Business is warning that “times are going to get tougher from here”…

“With the new rate projections, the Fed is engineering a hard landing — a soft landing is almost out of the question,” said Seema Shah, chief global strategist of Principal Global Investors. “Powell’s admission that there will be below-trend growth for a period should be translated as central bank speak for ‘recession.’ Times are going to get tougher from here.”

Yes, times are definitely going to get tougher from here.

In fact, we are eventually headed for a meltdown of epic proportions.

But instead of working to prevent a historic crisis, the Federal Reserve is actually encouraging one.

The American people deserve some answers, because there is something about all of this that really stinks.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.

Things are starting to get really crazy in Germany.  The Germans are dealing with the worst inflation crisis that they have seen since the days of the Weimar Republic, and meanwhile economic activity is starting to shut down all over the nation.  Of course other European countries are facing similar problems, but Germany was supposed to be the economic rock that the rest of Europe could always depend upon.  Unfortunately, the decision by the Russians to cut off the flow of gas through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline is hitting Germany extremely hard.  If we could just get both sides to agree to end the war in Ukraine, that would greatly help matters, but that simply isn’t going to happen.  In fact, it appears that Vladimir Putin has decided to greatly escalate matters, and the western powers will inevitably greatly escalate matters in response.  What this means is that the economic turmoil that we are witnessing in Europe isn’t going anywhere any time soon.

This week, we got some inflation numbers out of Germany that are so high that it is difficult to believe that they are actually real…

German producer prices rose in August at the fastest rate since records began in 1949, data released by the Federal Statistical Office showed today, pointing to a further increase in consumer prices.

Producer prices of industrial products rose by 45.8 percent compared to the same month of last year. Compared to July 2022, prices rose 7.9 percent.

Soaring energy prices on the back of Russia’s war against the Ukraine remain the main driver behind rising prices.

If we continue to see monthly increases of around 8 percent, next year at this time we could be talking about a yearly jump of close to 100 percent.

Wow.

How bad do things have to get before we actually start using the term “hyperinflation”?

Energy prices are the biggest reason why inflation has gotten completely out of control, and the German government has been forced to nationalize a huge natural gas company in order to keep it from going under…

The German government is closing in on an agreement to nationalize gas giant Uniper SE, as Berlin moves to stave off a collapse of the country’s energy sector.

A provisional agreement between the government, Uniper and its main shareholder, Finland’s Fortum Oyj, has been reached, according to people familiar with the situation. While contracts haven’t been signed, Berlin is aiming for an announcement later this week.

According to the CEO of Uniper, the company has been losing about 100 million euros a day during this crisis.

Needless to say, the German government cannot save everyone, and so a lot of firms won’t survive this crisis at all.

For example, a manufacturer that has been making toilet paper for Germans for nearly 100 years is now headed into insolvency…

Hakle has been a German household name since 1928, but the Duesseldorf-based toilet paper manufacturer said all it took was this summer’s gas price shock to drive it into insolvency.

Sadly, this is just the beginning.

According to the German central bank, the nation is moving into a “broad-based and prolonged decline in economic output”…

“Economic activity may pull back somewhat this quarter and shrink markedly in the autumn and winter months,” the central bank said, adding that it didn’t forecast this adverse scenario in a June report.

Bundesbank continued: “There are mounting signs of a recession in the German economy in the sense of a clear, broad-based and prolonged decline in economic output.” It said a contraction is expected in the third quarter with deeper declines in economic activity in the fourth.

“High inflation and uncertainty with regard to energy supply and its costs affect not only the gas and electricity-intensive industry and its export business and investments, but also private consumption and the service providers dependent on it,” the central bank said.

You can refer to such a scenario as a “recession” or a “depression” if it makes you feel better.

I call it an economic collapse.

The U.S. economy will soon be experiencing immense turmoil as well.

According to billionaire Barry Sternlicht, the Fed’s exceedingly foolish policies are pushing us toward a “serious recession”…

In an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Thursday, Barry Sternlicht, the chairman and CEO of Starwood Capital, said he believes Americans are facing a major recession if the Federal Reserve proceeds with several more rate hikes as a means of curbing inflation, which is reportedly the central bank’s plan.

“The economy is braking hard,” Sternlicht told the financial news outlet, according to the Daily Caller. “If the Fed keeps this up, they are going to have a serious recession and people will lose their jobs.”

He is right on target, but instead of saying “people will lose their jobs” he should have noted that lots of people are already being laid off.  This is something that I have been documenting on my website for quite some time, and this week we learned that Gap has decided to lay off hundreds of corporate workers…

Gap Inc. is cutting about 500 corporate jobs as the clothing retailer struggles with declining sales.

The job cuts, which include open positions, will be primarily at Gap’s offices in San Francisco, New York and Asia and hit various departments, a representative for the retailer confirmed Tuesday. The moves were first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

Ouch.

In this environment, very few workers are truly safe.

At this point, even the entertainment industry is letting lots of people go…

The struggling TV and film industry continues to run face first into bad news. This week it was reported that Warner Bros. Discovery was firing 100 TV ad salespeople at the same time that Paramount has considered ending offering Showtime as a standalone service, Bloomberg reported.

Netflix followed suit with their own layoffs, the report says. The company has reportedly let go hundreds of employees and abandoned some of its office space. At the same time, the firm’s stock price has collapsed and fallen more than 60% from its all time highs.

Back in 2008 and 2009, millions of Americans lost their jobs.

Will we see something similar in the months ahead?

And just like during “the Great Recession”, the housing market is really starting to slow down.  In fact, we just learned that homebuilder confidence has now fallen for nine months in a row…

The confidence of builders of single-family houses fell again in September, the ninth month in a row of declines, “as the combination of elevated interest rates, persistent building material supply chain disruptions, and high home prices continue to take a toll on affordability,” the NAHB report said.

With today’s index value of 46, the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index is now below where it had been in May 2006, on the way down into the Housing Bust.

This time around, it won’t just be a few areas of the planet that suffer.

At this moment we are literally witnessing economic implosions all over the planet, and the stage is being set for an immensely painful 2023.

The one thing that could really turn things around would be peace.

Unfortunately, global leaders on both sides seem absolutely determined to drag us into the type of cataclysmic global conflict that I have been warning about for years.

So there isn’t going to be peace, and that means that things are going to get really bad in 2023 and beyond.

But I also believe that you were put at this specific moment in history for a reason.

It is when times are the darkest that the greatest good can be done, and that is something that we will all need to remember during the very dark times in front of us.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “7 Year Apocalypse” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written five other books that are available on Amazon.com including  “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, “Get Prepared Now”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending digital copies as gifts through Amazon to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior today.