Alert: Dollar & Markets at Risk to Plummet – John Williams

Is John Williams of shadowstats.com scare-mongering, or is he prescient?  You decide.  But look at his calculation methods of economic metrics and how they differ from official numbers, and WHY they are different.

https://usawatchdog.com/alert-dollar-markets-at-risk-to-plummet-john-williams/

U.S. Economy-Plunge, Stagnation & Turning Down Anew-John Williams

http://usawatchdog.com/u-s-economy-plunge-stagnation-turning-down-anew-john-williams/

Russian Dollar Dump Could Crash Financial System-John Williams

http://usawatchdog.com/russian-dollar-dump-could-crash-financial-system-john-williams/

John Williams - We Are Beginning To Approach The End Game

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2013/7/3_John_Williams_-_We_Are_Beginning_To_Approach_The_End_Game.html

John Williams - Gold Panic & The Accelerating Great Collapse

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2013/6/27_John_Williams_-_Gold_Panic_%26_The_Accelerating_Great_Collapse.html

Ben Bernanke’s Real Message for Gold Investors, Translated by John Williams

http://jutiagroup.com/20130624-ben-bernankes-real-message-for-gold-investors-translated-by-john-williams/

Dollar Sell-off and Hyperinflation by 2014 – John Williams

My timetable for a dollar collapse is between 2013 - 2015.  I guess Williams split the difference.  The truth of the matter is it is impossible to predict the exact timing of events with reasonable accuracy, and when they materialize, it's mostly due to luck.  But if history is any guide, bull markets in gold during the 20th century--usually accompanied by economic and financial uncertainty--lasted 14 years.  The price of gold made a double bottom in 1999 and 2001.

If the number 14 seems arbitrary or coincidental, it may not be.  It usually takes a generation of doubters and short memories before reality takes hold.  Gold bugs have been mocked and ridiculed during this whole 11-year bull market run, despite gold appreciating 7-fold.  We're being castigated as lunatics even though we have been right for over a decade, over four decades, and over several millenia.

Meanwhile, the masses, both professional and retail investors, have been touting or buying equities, bonds, and real estate.  Equities have tanked twice in a decade, while real estate is still bouncing along its bottom.  The bond market has rallied for almost 30 years, but its upside is now severely limited--by definition, as yields are essentially 0%.  The credit bubble is one for the ages.

What should give readers pause about rosy predictions from mainstream, Keynesian economists is they are notoriously wrong at every turn.  Look to the Austrian school of economists, as they warned of the subprime mortgage crisis with uncanny accuracy, assigning soaring debt levels as the primary cause of the bubble bursting.

http://usawatchdog.com/dollar-sell-off-and-hyperinflation-by-2014-john-williams/

John Williams: The US Has $100 Trillion in Debts & Obligations

The official $15 trillion debt figure is fictitious.  It's actually much higher.


http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2011/12/30_John_Williams__The_US_Has_%24100_Trillion_in_Debts_%26_Obligations.html

John Williams - Gold to Prevail as System Falls into Disorder

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2011/12/20_John_Williams_-_Gold_to_Prevail_as_System_Falls_into_Disorder.html

John Williams of shadowstats.com on GDP data

http://www.shadowstats.com/index.php

“. . .the widely-followed gross domestic product (GDP) nonetheless remains the most-heavily-biased, the most-heavily-guessed-at, the most-heavily politicized and the most-worthless major indicator of domestic business activity.  Today’s numbers out of the Bureau of Economic Analysis are outright nonsense.  Consider that latest numbers showed that the level of inflation-adjusted third-quarter 2011 GDP broke above the pre-recession high of fourth-quarter 2007: a full recovery.  That is absurd.  No other major economic indicator, including payrolls, real (inflation-adjusted) retail sales, industrial production, trade deficit or housing starts is showing that.”  - John Williams, shadowstats.com, commenting on official 2011 Q3 GDP growth of 2.5%.

John Williams: Weak Dollar Behind Inflationary Oil Prices

http://www.theenergyreport.com/pub/na/9452

John Williams - The Great US Collapse Nears

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/KWN_DailyWeb/Entries/2011/3/15_John_Williams_-_The_Great_US_Collapse_Nears.html

ShadowStats' John Williams Explains Why It's All Been Downhill Since 1973

http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/shadowstats-john-williams-explains-why-its-all-been-downhill-1973/53536#new

John Williams from shadowstats.com

http://www.mineweb.com/mineweb/view/mineweb/en/page72068?oid=103698&sn=Detail

If you look at those GAAP-based statements and include in the deficit the year-to-year change in the net present value of the unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare, what you'll find is that the annual operating shortfall is running between $4 and $5 trillion; not $500 billion as we saw before the crisis or the $1.4 trillion that they announced for fiscal 2009. Now to put that into perspective, if the government wanted to balance its deficit on a GAAP basis for a year, and it seized all personal income and corporate profits, taxing everything 100%, it would still be in deficit. It can't raise taxes enough to contain this. On the other side, if it cut all government spending except for Social Security and Medicare, it still would be in deficit. With no political will to contain the spending, eventually the government meets its obligations by revving up the currency printing press.

Lies and omissions

http://usawatchdog.com/real-deficit-numbers-and-real-consequences/

The reason why I ask is the government uses accounting gimmicks to make just about every number it puts out look better than what it really is. For example, the most recent Consumer Price Index for inflation was officially 2.7%; but if you compute inflation the way Bureau of Labor Statistics did it in 1980, the inflation rate would be 9.7%. The same goes for unemployment. Officially, it stands at 10%; but if computed the way BLS did it prior to 1994, it would come out to 21.9%. (source: shadowstats.com)

I asked economist John Williams of shadowstats.com to weigh in on last year’s record $1.4 trillion of red ink for the “real” deficit number. Williams told me, “It was closer to $2 trillion because they knocked off $500 billion with accounting gimmicks.”

In its latest budget, the White House is projecting $1.56 trillion in red ink, and that is another new record! What will the “real” deficit be when the year is over? Williams says, “With a weaker than expected economy, the 2010 deficit likely will top $2 trillion…”

No matter how the government does its accounting, the actual deficit will have to be financed. America will have 3 choices: (1) raise taxes to the moon in a very bad economy, (2) get foreigners to buy more debt, and (3) monetize the debt. (print money to pay the bills) Williams chooses what’s behind door #3. In his latest report he says, “…worse-than-projected borrowing needs for the U.S. Treasury likely will trigger increasing flight from the U.S. dollar. At such time as that moves to a panicked level, and U.S. Treasuries increasingly are dumped or otherwise shunned, the Fed will have little choice but to monetize the Treasury debt, becoming the buyer of last resort for Treasuries. Those circumstances should lead to mounting inflation woes and flight-to-safety outside the U.S. dollar, particularly to hard assets such as gold and silver…”

There is another possible consequence to record deficits–higher interest rates! Countries around the globe with high deficits are starting to see interest rates rise. For example, Greece is facing a huge debt load and interest rates there are skyrocketing. In a recent article from “Money and Markets,” analyst Mike Larson put it this way, “Imagine what would happen if Uncle Sam’s borrowing costs shot up like they have in Greece — by 60 percent! Imagine what that would mean for the cost of car loans, mortgages, and other products whose rates track Treasury yields! And imagine the impact on an economy still struggling to recover from the Great Recession! This is the next big story that few people are talking about.”

The founder of “Money and Markets,” Dr. Martin D. Weiss, went on to say, “…unless the Obama administration and Congress can somehow ax the budget or find a new gusher of revenues — both extremely unlikely anytime soon — collapsing U.S. bond prices and sharply higher long-term interest rates are unavoidable.”

The most recent record breaking budget does not take into account what we will spend in the continued bailout of failed mortgage giants Fannie and Freddie. The two were nationalized last year and, on Christmas Eve, the Treasury decided to give them both unlimited bailout funds for the next three years! There is a total of $8 trillion in liability.

So, it looks like higher inflation or higher interest rates or both are coming.

John Williams of shadowstats.com

John Williams, founder of the website shadowstats.com, is infamous for publishing true unemployment and underemployment numbers. He is now oft-quoted and cited even among government economists, so his statistics have legitimacy behind them. He is not viewed as a wild-eyed radical extremist, which make his forecasts extremely discomfiting, if not alarming.

http://www.fairfieldweekly.com/article.cfm?aid=16014