I cannot think of any country that does not need a clean-out such as this. In my opinion, this is the tiny portion of the iceberg above the water line. No wonder those sucking from the endless teat are so dedicated to fighting against DOGE. The hard working taxpayers are growing skinnier by the day whilst those benefitting from no work payouts get fatter.

I think anyone opposing this transparent scrutiny should be thoroughly investigated.

If you are interested in looking at the site it is www.doge.gov, There is some fascinating information there and instructive ways to spend other people’s money.

The News we were waiting for April 2 from Donald Trump

I have linked and placed an entire article on tariffs by Ray Dalio below, which is instructive. I have seen and experienced both sides of the equation. When in South Africa we were sanctioned, the innovation and localization of industry was outstandingly good. The cost to countries applying the sanctions and damage to long-term relationships was immeasurably bad.

Whilst not the same as sanctions, tariffs have similar effects without the undesirable relationship difficulties, as this is shifted from the supplier directly to the government.

See full article here

Platinum

Sell: (14 February 2025) Is holding its own. No buy signal yet. It appears to be in a long sideways movement. One could trade the swings.

Uranium

Sell: (28 Mar 2025) Uranium is a sell and looking weak.

BITCOIN AND GOLD

Buy bitcoin versus gold (18 March 2025). This pair appears to be moving sideways. I would wait with the current signal for a change.

ETHUSD: SELL: 29 March 2025. ETH broke down, not up but it has indicators that could turn. I am not excited by the money flows which appear to be negative.

BTCUSD: SELL: 29 March 2025. Bitcoin could not hold the upward trajectory against the fall of the NASDAQ (Cyan). Does this mean we have more to fall on BTC before a recovery?

GOLD AND SILVER STOCKS

Gold and Silver Stocks

Gold stocks outperforming gold. (06 March 2025). The chart is almost a swap to holding gold against stocks. This should resolve in the next few days.

Silver stocks outperform silver (06 March 2025). This ratio is on the cusp of change. But the signal is not definitive.

GOLD AND SILVER

Silver to Gold Ratio

Gold outperforming Silver. (Signal given 18 March 2025) Signals all over the place. The trend is gold outperforming silver.

GOLD TO USD

Gold outperforms USD, (11 March 2025). A reversal is extremely close but the indicators have not been violated yet.

A LOOK AT THE GOLD AND SILVER CHARTS

Gold’s low of the week was $3,054.00 and the high was $3,168.00, now trading at around $3,112.00.

• Gold Monthly:  is a hold. We bought in at $1,800.00 in October 2023. Funds flows into the metal are substantial.  No sell signal yet. (Chart below).
• Gold Weekly:  (Buy 13 January 2025)   Overbought, looking good. No sell signals yet. Looking like a top. 
• Gold Daily: (Buy 13 March 2025). Continuing to rise, looking overbought and toppy.  No sell yet.

The low for Silver this week was $31.74 and the high $34.47  trading around $31.99 at present.

• Silver Monthly: Hold. (Buy:  $24.00 March 2024). Weakening.  No sell yet. (Chart below).
• Silver Weekly: (Buy 27 January 2025) Looking weaker and overbought. Funds flow diminishing. No sell yet. 
• Silver Daily: Buy. (4 March 2025). Hold looking weak, but holding.

Our partner has stock of both gold, silver and Goldbacks in our vaults available in Panama. Please contact us for more information.

A video by Mike Adams on the Goldbacks. 

Well worth a look!

On the Stockcharts.com charts, the blue vertical lines are our proprietary system buy signals and the red vertical lines are system sell signals – for information purposes only

An interview with Josh, owner of Scottsdale Mint:

Please contact us to arrange the purchase and storage of your gold and silver requirements in a safe, insured location outside of your jurisdiction.

If you are interested in an overview of Fort Kobbe, you may want to have a look at this video: Mike Brown, Director, Fort Kobbe, International Vaults, A DotCom Magazine Exclusive Interview

This is my interpretation of the market and is not to be taken as financial advice. Before making any buy or sell decisions I recommend that you consult with your professional financial advisor.

The Effects of Tariffs: How the Machine Works

Ray Dalio 

Founder, CIO Mentor, and Member of the Bridgewater Board

April 2, 2025

Tariffs are taxes that:

1) raise revenue for the country imposing them that both the foreign producers and the domestic consumers pay (how much paid by each depends on their relative elasticities), which makes them an attractive tax

2) reduce the global efficiencies of production

3) are stagflationary for the world as a whole, more deflationary for the tariffed producer, and more inflationary for the importer that imposes the tariffs

4) make companies in the importing/tariffing countries more protected from foreign competition in the domestic market, which make them less efficient but more capable of surviving if aggregate domestic demand is maintained through monetary and fiscal policy

5) are necessary in times of an international great power conflict to assure domestic capabilities for production

6) can reduce both current account and capital account imbalances, which in plain English means reducing the dependencies on foreign production and foreign capital which is especially valued in times of global geopolitical conflicts/wars.

Those are the first order consequences.

A lot of what happens from there depends on how:

1. tariffs are responded to by the tariffed country/countries
2. currency rates are changed
3. monetary policies and interest rates are changed by the central banks and
4. fiscal policies are changed by the central governments in response to these pressures.

Those are the second order consequences.

More specifically regarding these:

1) if tariffs are responded to with reciprocal tariffs, the effects will be more broad-based stagflation,

2) if the monetary policies are eased, real interest rates decline, and the currency is weakened in countries where the deflationary forces are greatest (which is a normal central bank response) and/or the monetary policy is tightened, real rates are raised, and the currency is strengthened where the inflationary forces are greatest (which is a normal central bank response) and/or

3) the fiscal policy is eased where there is disinflationary weakness and/or fiscal policy is tightened where there is inflationary strength, with such changes neutralizing some of the deflationary or inflationary effects.

So there are a lot of moving parts and there is a lot to measure in order to judge the market impacts of big tariffs. These impacts go beyond the first six first points I made about the first order effects of tariffs, which are influenced by the second order effects I referred to.

However, what is clear as the background and the future is that:

1) the production, trade, and capital imbalances (most importantly the debts) must come down one way or another, because they are dangerously unsustainable for monetary, economic, and geopolitical reasons (so the current monetary, economic, and geopolitical orders must change)

2) they will likely come with abrupt, unconventional changes (like those I describe in my new book How Countries Go Broke: The Big Cycle) and

3) the longer term monetary, political, and geopolitical effects will depend mostly on the trust in the quality of the debt and capital markets as a safe store-hold of wealth, countries’ productivity levels, and the political systems that make countries attractive places to live, work, and invest.

Additionally, there is a lot of talk now about whether it is a helpful or harmful thing that 1) the the U.S. dollar is the world’s primary reserve currency and 2) the dollar is strong. It is clearly a good thing that the dollar is a reserve currency (because it creates a greater demand for its debt and other capital than would otherwise exist if the U.S. doesn’t have that privilege to abuse via over-borrowing). Though since the markets drive such things, it inevitably contributes to abusing this privilege and over-borrowing and debt problems which has gotten us to where we now are (i.e., needing to deal with the inevitable reducing of goods, services, and capital imbalances, needing to take extraordinary measures to reduce the debt burdens, and reducing foreign dependencies on these things because of geopolitical circumstances.) More specifically, it has been said that China’s RMB should be appreciated which probably could be agreed to between the Americans and Chinese as part of some trade and capital deal, ideally made when Trump and Xi meet. That and/or other non-market, non-economic adjustments would have unique and challenging impacts on the countries they apply to, which would lead to some of the second order consequences I mentioned earlier happening to cushion the effects.

I will watch what is to come and will keep you posted on what I think will be the first and second order consequences.