#129: The Best Investment I Ever Made

Author

micksonmatch
August 22, 2024

28 years ago today, I married the woman of my dreams. The dividends from this investment are infinitely higher-yielding than any material investment. I am blessed.

S2N Spotlight

In keeping with the theme of the last few days of looking at investments in “sound money” terms, that is, gold, we will look at nominal GDP in $ and gold terms.

Essentially, since 2002, the US economy has been going backwards in sound money terms. The blue, beautifully upward-sloping headline (nominal) line does not show you the value destruction that gold-adjusted GDP shows you.

S2N Observations

I love playing with new datasets. I came across this one from the Institute of International Finance. The global debt as of the end of Q1, 2024 is $315 trillion. This number was under $100 trillion at the turn of the century (24 years ago). To put things into more comparable terms, I calculated the year-on-year growth of the debt with the green line and the right y-axis. You can see that debt is still growing at 7%, despite growth coming down from crazy levels over the last decade. It is no wonder that the world has experienced a level of inflation not experienced for many decades.

Yesterday, there was a major revision in the non-farm payrolls over the previous year. I cannot remember the exact numbers but about 700,000 jobs that they said were there turned out not to be there. Unless there is a place where we can no longer find. So there you have it.

By the way, just to throw a little conspiracy into the mix,. The release of the revision was delayed for some “technical” reason. However, three banks were informed of the revision when they called the bureau for details of the release. It’s a pity most people’s A.I. models have forgotten how to pick up the phone to speak to the secretary.

Just take a look at the chart gallery below. Some epic stuff is going down; down is the wrong word, as it is not all down. I want to end with this warning. In my opinion, the market is setting up for a major correction. I have said this often, and I still believe it. We are on the verge of a new all-time high. The employment revision will give the Fed room to act sooner than they have been saying. This will provide the election boost they want for the incumbent. I am torn. Can the market sell off in the face of an election? I think so, but the odds are against me.

Performance Review

Chart Gallery

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