The Economic Collapse

Things weren’t supposed to move this quickly.  Just hours after First Republic was dissected, two more major banks are in very serious trouble.  Are the dominoes going to start to fall more quickly than we were anticipating?  After his bank gobbled up First Republic, Jamie Dimon told the world that “this part of the crisis is over”, and many in the corporate media believed him.  Unfortunately, Wall Street is not buying it.  On Tuesday, “fears around contagion in the regional banking sector” pushed stock prices significantly lower… (Read More...)

Yes, you read the headline correctly.  Collectively, the three big banks that have collapsed in 2023 had more assets than all 25 banks that collapsed in 2008 did.  Unfortunately, the banking collapse of 2023 is far from over.  We still have eight more months to go before this year is done, and many more banks are currently teetering on the brink of disaster.  Executives at those banks are telling us not to worry, but of course executives at First Republic were issuing similar assurances just last week.  Personally, I had heard that First Republic supposedly had enough reserves to keep going for months.  But that was a lie, and now First Republic is toast.  The following comes from the official statement that the FDIC issued when it took over the bank… (Read More...)

It should have been apparent to everyone that the dark clouds on the horizon would bring a storm, and now rain is furiously falling all around us.  Our entire system is being viciously shaken, and the dominoes are going to continue to fall in the months ahead.  Once Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank went down, we all knew that it was just a matter of time before more large banks started to implode.  Now First Republic has failed, and over the weekend U.S. regulators were working very hard to arrange a sale… (Read More...)

The biggest companies in the United States are giving the axe to hundreds of thousands of workers, but this should not come as a shock to any of us.  Officials at the Federal Reserve were warned over and over again that they were going to create an extremely harsh economic environment if they aggressively raised interest rates, and that is exactly what has transpired.  We haven’t seen a tsunami of layoffs like this since 2008 and 2009, and the outlook for the months ahead is extremely bleak. (Read More...)

Is another domino about to fall?  Our system was greatly shaken when Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank suddenly collapsed, but we seem to have weathered that storm.  But what will happen if an even larger bank goes under?  As of March 31st, First Republic had approximately 290 billion dollars in assets, and that makes it much larger than Silicon Valley Bank was when it finally imploded.  A 30 billion dollar rescue plan that was hastily put together last month was supposed to stabilize First Republic, but that hasn’t worked.  On Tuesday, First Republic shares fell by about 50 percent after the public learned that “customers withdrew more than $100 billion during last month’s crisis”… (Read More...)

If we don’t get to have Tucker Carlson, they don’t get to have a network.  That is the message that we need to send to Fox News.  A few hours ago, I participated in the taping of a panel discussion about the firing of Tucker Carlson for a television show.  Former Fox News contributor Brigitte Gabriel was also on the panel, and she boldly declared that it is time for a national boycott of Fox News.  I couldn’t agree more.  Tucker Carlson was the only reason why many of us ever watched Fox News.  Like so many others, Tucker could have chosen to play it safe so that he could have continued to rake in millions of dollars, but instead he consciously made a decision to relentlessly tell the truth no matter the consequences.  By unceremoniously dumping Tucker like a smelly bag of garbage, executives at Fox News have not only shown great contempt for a national hero, but they have also shown great contempt for all of us who watched him.  Unless Fox News offers Tucker his job back and issues a truly groveling apology to the viewers, we should steadfastly refuse to ever watch the channel again. (Read More...)

Right now, financial institutions all over America are getting really tight with their money.  That means that less credit will be available for consumers and businesses, and that will mean less economic activity in the months ahead.  When economic activity slows down, more businesses fail, more layoffs happen, and more consumers start defaulting on their debts.  Of course if economic conditions steadily deteriorate it will cause financial institutions to get even more stingy with their money.  It appears that a vicious cycle has now started, and I believe that this will be one of the biggest stories of the next 6 months. (Read More...)

Once in a while, there is a moment that embodies what is going on in our society as a whole.  For me, one of those moments came on Saturday night.  A 45 foot tall animatronic dragon at Disneyland erupted in flames, but most of the people at the park seemed to think that it was no big deal.  The vast majority of them just went about their business as though nothing unusual was happening.  Incredibly, most of those that were there seemed to think that everything was “normal” even though an absolutely enormous fire was sending “massive flames” into the night sky… (Read More...)