Trends & News

This asset has outperformed the Tulip Bubble, Mississippi Bubble, and dot-com Bubble

This morning I had the pleasure of spending an hour of my life tracking down a missing wire transfer that had been sent to a large, multinational bank more than two weeks ago.

I’m sure you’ve been there, being passed around various departments like the village bicycle, each time having to re-explain the entire situation to someone brand new.

Finally someone found the missing funds, and the person told me me they would[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 23, 2017
  • Lugano, Switzerland

It’s now a “human right” to NOT be offended. Unless you’re the one who’s offended.

In the latest episode of the completely psychotic breakdown of Western values, Canada’s government has just passed a law that champions sexual identity over science.

It’s called C-16, “An Act to Amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code”.

Both of these codes prohibit discrimination against individuals based on race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, etc.

And this new law includes gender identity in that list.

Great. Nothing wrong with[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 21, 2017
  • Lugano, Switzerland

Argentina issues 100-year bond. What could possibly go wrong?

Apparently while I was in the air yesterday flying between Asia and Europe, the financial system proved once again that it believes in magic beans.

The latest absurdity is that the government of Argentina sold $2.75 billion worth of bonds yesterday afternoon.

It’s not strange or unusual for a government to sell bonds; it happens multiple times across the world nearly every single day of the year.

What’s totally insane about yesterday’s[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 20, 2017
  • Zurich, Switzerland

Take advantage of this free insurance policy for your savings

This is the very first article I’m writing to you on the brand new Macbook Pro that I just purchased here in Hong Kong.

It’s the fully loaded version with 16GB of RAM, a 1 TB SSD hard drive, and 3.5 GHz i7 processor.

Given that I actually run Linux on may laptop and barely do anything outside of word processing a bit of programming, the purchase was probably overkill. But I got[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 19, 2017
  • Hong Kong

The foreign business incentives in this country can help double your income.

Yesterday I spent all afternoon meeting with government officials here in the Philippines, and I’m still in shock. I’ll explain--

About a year and a half ago I purchased a fairly large manufacturing business that is oddly enough based in Australia.

It’s been a fantastic investment so far, primarily because it generates so much cashflow relative to the price I paid.

With big public companies listed on a major stock market, it’s[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 16, 2017
  • Manila, Philippines

You won’t believe this stupid new law against Cash and Bitcoin

This one is almost too ridiculous to believe.

Recently a new bill was introduced on the floor of the US Senate entitled, pleasantly,

“Combating Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing, and Counterfeiting Act of 2017.”

You can probably already guess its contents.

Cash is evil.

Bitcoin is evil.

Now they’ve gone so far to include prepaid mobile phones, retail gift vouchers, or even electronic coupons. Evil, evil, and evil.

[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 14, 2017
  • Manila, Philippines

Banks are becoming less safe. Again.

What I’m about to tell you isn’t some wild conspiracy. Or fake news.

It’s raw fact, based on publicly available data from the US Federal Reserve.

This data shows a very simple but concerning trend: banks in the United States are becoming less safe. Again.

And they’re doing it on purpose. Again.

Few people ever give much thought to the safety and security of their bank.

After all, banks go[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 13, 2017
  • Bangkok, Thailand

Tim Price: “the UK today feels like a very strange, and disturbing, place”

[Editor’s note: This letter was written by Tim Price, frequent Sovereign Man contributor and manager of the VT Price Value Portfolio.]
If you have been voting for politicians who promise to give you goodies at someone else’s expense, then you have no right to complain when they take your money and give it to someone else, including themselves.

Economist Thomas Sowell
It is difficult to know where to begin.

In our election last[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Tim Price
  • June 12, 2017
  • London, UK

Record “Wealth” in America: 72% of US businesses are NOT profitable

The Federal Reserve in the United States just released a new report showing that “Total Household Wealth” in the United States has reached a record $94.8 trillion.

That’s an impressive figure.

Even more impressive is that Total Household Wealth has increased by $40 trillion since the lows of the Great Recession in 2009.

No doubt there’s probably a multitude of central bankers and bureaucrats toasting their success in having engineered such magnificent[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 12, 2017
  • Bangkok, Thailand

This is how a “bail-out” becomes a “bail-in”

Here’s the perfect example of how insane our financial system has become.

It was announced yesterday that, after a 24-hour white-knuckled ride, Spanish banking giant Banco Popular had been sold to Banco Santander for the price of just 1 euro.

Note- that’s 1 euro in TOTAL. Not 1 euro per share.

Banco Popular had once been one of Spain’s largest banks.

But just as certain banks tend to do from time[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 8, 2017
  • Rome, Italy

Clint Eastwood’s advice on Bitcoin speculation

In 1559 while on a trip to southern Bavaria, Swiss scientist Conrad Gesner spied a curious flower in the garden of a diplomat in Augsburg.

The flower was called a tulip, derived from the Persian word dulband, meaning “turban,” which described its conspicuous shape.

Gesner was intrigued.

He asked the man who owned the flower about its origins and determined that it came from Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire, modern-day Istanbul.

[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 6, 2017
  • En route to Rome

One more tremendous benefit to studying abroad

It’s that time of year again.

Countless high school students across the northern hemisphere are ceremoniously gliding their tassels from one side of their caps to the other and accepting a rolled-up piece of paper to commemorate the past four years of their lives.

Many of them will be thrust off to university in a few short months, where, at least in the Land of the Free, they’ll be loaded down with tens[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 5, 2017
  • Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile

Uber burned through almost as much money as NASA last quarter

Uber reported yesterday that its NET LOSS totaled more than $700 million last quarter, despite pulling in a whopping $3.4 billion in revenue.

(This means they spent at least $4.1 billion!)

That’s the latest in a string of massive, 9-figure quarterly losses for the company.

The only question I have is-- how much cocaine are these people buying?

Seriously, it’s REALLY HARD to spend so many billions of dollars.

You[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • June 1, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

The real reason to own Bitcoin

In 1483, just as Johannes Gutenberg’s new moveable type printing press was spreading across Europe, Sultan Bayezid II of the Ottoman Empire issued a staunch decree banning the machine from his realm.

At the time the Ottoman Empire was the dominant superpower in the world, having conquered most of the Middle East, North Africa, and southeastern Europe.

But Bayezid was afraid of the new technology.

He and his advisors felt that[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 31, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

Read this before following Warren Buffet’s investment advice

Not too long ago I received an email offering the luxury trip of a lifetime to Iceland.

It was a package tour... and super impressive.

We would have our own private helicopters taking us all over the island for seven days. There was horseback riding, dune buggies, even racing Ferarri and Lamborghini supercars across a frozen lake.

Then I saw the price: $150,000.

I looked again thinking I[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 29, 2017
  • Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile

… and now for the bad news

In the late 1760s and early 1770s, the government of France was in a deep panic.

They had recently suffered a disastrous and costly defeat in the Seven Years War, and the national budget was a complete mess.

France had spent most of the previous century as the world’s dominant superpower, and the government budget reflected that status.

From public hospitals to shiny monuments and museums, social programs and public works projects,[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 26, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

And the best performing stock market in the world is. . .

Pop quiz: What country has the world’s best performing stock market?

It’s not the United States. Or Canada. Or China.

The answer is Venezuela, whose primary stock market index over the last year is up nearly SEVEN FOLD, from 11,700 last summer to a record 72,700 today.

It’s amazing that a country where people are literally starving because there’s very little food available is seeing record stock market performance.

[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 25, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

Turkish NBA player has passport revoked by ‘the Hitler of our century’

Enes Kanter is a Turkish citizen who plays center for the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder.

Like many professional athletes, Kanter has a couple of charities in his name.

His education fund provides first-year college scholarships to support selected US students – including a family’s first female child and children of law enforcement and firefighters who lost their lives on duty.

Kanter’s other charity is the Light Foundation. This one has an international[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 23, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

The Final Show of the Greatest Country on Earth

On May 31, 1866, John C. Ringling was born in Iowa to German immigrants in what felt like an extremely bleak year.

The chaos and devastation from the Civil War that had ended in 1865 were still keenly felt, and the US economy was in the midst of a deep recession

The country was still shaken from the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

And the new President, Andrew Johnson, was embroiled in a[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 22, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

The worst guy on the planet

Jose Rafael Torrealba wins the award for biggest scumbag on the planet today.

Torrealba is a Venezuelan army general who was featured in a leaked audio recording that was just published yesterday.

The recording is of a meeting that took place a few weeks ago in Venezuela in which he and his fellow generals discuss how to keep the civilian population under control.

Torrealba’s solution? Use snipers against his own people.

[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 19, 2017
  • Los Angeles

“If you can keep it…”

On September 17, 1787 on the final day of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin was approached by a woman as he walked out of Independence Hall.

“Well Doctor, what have we got-- a republic, or a monarchy?” she asked.

It was a burning question on everyone’s mind: what form of government would the Constitutional delegates establish for the new country?

Franklin didn’t hesitate. “A republic-- if you can keep it.”
[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 18, 2017
  • Los Angeles, USA

Stocks hit record high on sagging performance, higher debt.

There’s something completely ridiculous happening around the world right now.

We can start in the United Kingdom, where the FTSE-100 stock market index hit an all-time high yesterday of 7454.

Simultaneously the British government released statistics yesterday showing that debt judgments and bankruptcy filings across the UK soared 35% in the first quarter of 2017 to the highest level in a decade.

British consumers are on a debt binge, borrowing (and now[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 16, 2017
  • Reno, Nevada, USA

We got robbed this weekend.

It’s true.

Over the weekend at an amazing, closed-door event that we held here in Las Vegas exclusively for our Total Access members, a number of us got robbed.

It happened on Saturday, which was an intense day packed with a dozen Q&A sessions with the CEOs of exciting private businesses in which we all invested.

But at the end of the day, I treated our group to live entertainment by a[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 15, 2017
  • Las Vegas, USA

It’s time to become your own banker. Here’s how–

Sometimes I wonder why most of the giant mega-banks are based in New York.

They should be here in Las Vegas, the gambling capital of the world. Because that’s precisely what they’re doing with your money.

Actually it’s not even your money.

From a legal perspective, every single penny you deposit at the bank becomes THEIR money. You’re nothing more than an unsecured creditor of the bank.

And now that they[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 12, 2017
  • Las Vegas, USA

1999 called, they want their stock bubble back…

File this one away under “Completely Obvious...”

Last night the parent company of Snapchat reported a quarterly loss of more than TWO BILLION dollars.

Snapchat, of course, is the photo-focused social networking app that’s adored by tweens and adults who still live with their parents.

(Talk about a lucractive demographic.)

The company IPO’d just a few months ago with a market capitalization of $30+ billion despite slowing growth and a[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 11, 2017
  • Dallas, Texas, USA

Do you own any ETFs or mutual funds? Read this.

A few days ago I spoke to a finance professor at Columbia University here in New York City who has been doing a deep dive on the financial management industry.

His results were pretty concerning.

One of the things that he said was that fund management fees have been dramatically declining over the past few years.

At face value this sounds like a good thing.

All mutual funds and ETFs charge[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 9, 2017
  • New York City, USA

Mining CEO explains why silver could reach $136.67

His remarks started off like dozens of presentations that I had heard so many times before. . .

“Without silver,” began the speaker, “our entire society would go back to the Stone Age.”

The speaker was the CEO of one of the largest silver mining companies in the world, and he was a special keynote at the annual closed-door meeting of the Atlas 400.

CEOs of mining companies almost always start their[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 8, 2017
  • New York City, USA

Waiter and Bartender jobs surge in the Land of the Free

The headline in the New York Times today read “U.S. Job Growth Bounces Back; Unemployment at 10-Year Low”.

That’s certainly one way of looking at it.

The US Department of Labor released its regular jobs report this morning showing the official unemployment rate is just 4.4% in the Land of the Free.

That’s certainly a strong number; I’m sure plenty of people in Venezuela and Turkey would love to have an unemployment[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 5, 2017
  • New York City, USA

Just a quick reminder of who’s really in charge

Today the world of banking and finance waited with baited breath for the Federal Reserve in the United States to hike... or not to hike... interest rates.

This happens several times each year as the central bank’s Federal Open Market Committee gathers to set monetary policy in the Land of the Free.

To be clear, there is no greater power over a nation than having control of its money supply and interest rates.
[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 3, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

I never knew how screwed up global banking was until I started my own bank

By late 2014 I’d finally had enough.

After so many run-ins with the bitter incompetence and bureaucratic indignity of the banking system, I decided once and for all that I would start my own bank.

I probably should have had my head examined, but instead I called one of my attorneys to talk through the options.

Had I known then what I know now, I think I still would have made the[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 2, 2017
  • Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile

The myth of the “early bird”

You’ve probably heard the saying “The Early Bird Gets the Worm. . .”

It turns out that expression is completely wrong, both literally and figuratively.

This morning I was watching these new baby chicks run around and play on the lawn.

If you’ve never seen chickens up close and personal, their lives are pretty simple; they basically just wander around all day pecking at the ground looking for some insect or seed[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • May 1, 2017
  • Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile

This bubble finally burst. Which one’s next?

Like so many other high-flying Silicon Valley startups, Clinkle was supposed to ‘make the world a better place’.

Founded in 2011 by a guy barely out of his teens, the company picked up early buzz after proclaiming they would disrupt mobile payments. Or something.

Silicon Valley venture capital firms were apparently so impressed with the idea that they showered the company with an unprecedented level of cash.

(Given that investing in an[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • April 26, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

New Poll: Record number of Americans want MORE government in their lives

In a poll conducted a few days ago by NBC News / Wall Street Journal, a record 57% of Americans responded that they want MORE government in their lives, and that the government should be doing more to solve people’s problems.

That’s the highest percentage since they started asking this question in 1995.

In fact, 57% is nearly double what people responded in the mid-90s.

Furthermore, the number of Americans who feel[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • April 24, 2017
  • Sovereign Valley Farm, Chile

The last time this happened the market crashed

A few days ago Charles Schwab, the investment brokerage firm, announced that the number of new brokerage accounts soared 44% during the first quarter of 2017.

More specifically, Schwab stated that individual investors are opening up stock trading accounts at the fastest pace the company has seen in 17 years.

17 years.

Anyone remember what happened 17 years ago?

Oh right. The Dot-com bubble burst.

After years of unbelievable[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • April 21, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile

Finally. The Breakthrough.

Finally, the breakthrough.

After months of experimentation and failure, I finally managed to crack the code and successfully distill my first batch of homemade ethanol.

I botched the job the first seven times and ended up with useless buckets of goo, so I’m pretty excited right now.

It turns out that it’s not even that hard.

I started with unused fruit that literally falls off the trees in my organic[...] Click here to continue reading
  • Simon Black
  • April 20, 2017
  • Santiago, Chile