The Peter Schiff Show Podcast

VISIT PETER AT THE LAS VEGAS MONEY SHOW May 13 – 15, 2019 https://conferences.moneyshow.com/moneyshow-las-vegas/speakers/4532d84bf93311d3a5dd00104b96e7b5/peter-schiff/ Recorded March 26, 2019 Feigned Attempt to Shrink the Balance Sheet I am finally back on land, having spent 9 days at sea, at the Investors Summit at Sea.  I've been doing this annually now, this is my 7th time doing that. I am now back, technically one calendar year older.  I want to catch up a little bit on what happened in the market later last week.  I did do that one podcast from the ship following the complete capitulation on the part of the Federal Reserve, basically calling off all of the rate hikes that anybody thought may have been coming for the remainder of the year.  Also calling off their feigned attempt to shrink the balance sheet - quantitative tightening.  The balance sheet will barely shrink between now and the end of the summer, when it will stop shrinking altogether; if they can even keep up the pretense for that long. Nobody Appreciates What the Fed Has Done If you remember, when I was forecasting that this was going to happen, at the very beginning, in fact even before the Fed began to shrink its balance sheet, before the Fed raised rates for the first time, I said that if they ever tried to normalize interest rates, if they ever tried to shrink the balance sheet, they would ultimately abort the process - that they would fail in their mission. They could not complete the journey. It would create a huge problem for the Fed, which up until this point, it hasn't happened yet. Nobody really appreciates what the Fed has done. There Will Be an Excuse A lot of the people in the investment community are still buying at face value what the Fed is saying. But remember, when I said the Fed was going to announce that it was going to stop the rate hikes or call off quantitative tightening, I said at the time, that they were going to come up with an excuse. That the Fed was not going to tell the markets the truth about why it had aborted this mission - it was just going to make up an excuse. The Fed had to pretend that they could actually do this - that they were going to normalize interest rates, that they were going to shrink their balance sheet but something prevented them from doing it.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

VISIT PETER AT THE LAS VEGAS MONEY SHOW May 13 - 15, 2019 https://conferences.moneyshow.com/moneyshow-las-vegas/speakers/4532d84bf93311d3a5dd00104b96e7b5/peter-schiff/ Recording Today's Podcast from Willemstad, Curaçao I am recording today's podcast from my cabin on a cruise ship, which is right now docked on the Dutch island of Curaçao, which is about 35 miles north of Venezuela.  I've never actually been to this island, even though I live in the Caribbean now, in Puerto Rico, there are still many places in the Caribbean that I have not visited. I really wish I'd come here sooner. I had no idea how beautiful this island was.  Not really the beaches, so much, although I'm sure they are equally spectacular. I didn't go to the beach.  I just spent the day walking around town. But it's probably the most charming Caribbean island I've been to, as far as the architecture and the way the town is laid out - how beautiful the streets are, and the buildings and how clean they are.  It really seems like a nice place to live. I think there is a permanent population of about 160,000 people. The Fed's Decision I want to spend my limited time on today's podcast talking about the Federal Reserve's decision today and the press conference.  I did get back on the boat in time to watch the press conference live, and I do want to limit today's podcast to that discussion. Before the Fed announced its decision on interest rates - nobody expected a rate hike, and we did not get a rate hike, but before the Fed announced today's decision, the markets were on the defensive.  Earlier in the day, Donald Trump had mentioned that he now thinks that the tariffs on Chinese imports, or on Americans who want to buy Chinese imports, may remain in effect for a much longer period of time; indicating that maybe this great trade deal is not as close as the President was letting on in the past. Unexpected Dovishness So the markets sold off. I think the Dow, maybe at the lows was down about 170-some odd points, not exactly sure, but then, when the Fed announced its decision not to hike, the market erased all of those losses, and I think at one point we were up close to triple digits. Nobody was expecting a hike; I think they were expecting the Fed to be dovish, but I don't think they were expecting the Fed to be this dovish.    Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Recorded March 13, 2019 VISIT PETER AT THE LAS VEGAS MONEY SHOW May 13 - 15, 2019 https://conferences.moneyshow.com/moneyshow-las-vegas/speakers/4532d84bf93311d3a5dd00104b96e7b5/peter-schiff/ Big Drop in Boeing: Opportunity to buy into Dip The Dow is continuing to rebound this week, up 148 points today - 25,702 was the close.  In fact, the Dow would be higher if it weren't for an about 11% decline in Boeing so far this week. I am going to talk on this podcast about the controversy surrounding Boeing and their 737 Max 8 aircraft.  But for now I want to talk just about the markets.  I actually think that it was the big gap down on Monday morning, where Boeing first reacted to the news of the plane crash in Ethiopia and the Dow was down better than 200 points - all of it the big drop in Boeing. I think traders looked at that news as an opportunity to buy into the dip.  I think you saw people rushing in at that point. That kind of marked a short term bottom in the market and now we're back up around the highs of this bear market correction. Smarter Money Selling into this Rally I do believe that we're going to be running into resistance again at this area - but that was probably an opportunity for some people, they saw that dip and they rushed in and they bought other stocks.  Typically there's some kind of news event that would coincide with some type of inflection point in the market.  I don't think it's a significant low; I just think it is a low in an ongoing process, this bear market rally, this correction in the bear market is not ending quickly, but I do believe it is ending. I think the smarter money is selling into this rally. Retail Sales: December was not a Fluke The economic news - a couple of items that came out this week were a little better than estimated.  But look at the Retail Sales number that came out on Monday. That one, to me, still confirms that the numbers that we got in December were not a fluke.  A lot of people initially dismissed the weak number in December.  The initial report for December Retail Sales was -1.2. They were looking for a rebound in January and the got one. They were only looking for a rebound of .1 and they got a rebound of .2. They actually revised the prior month that was originally reported as down 1.2, that moved to down 1.6. So an even bigger decline December than was originally reported.  Remember, this is a 10-year low.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Market Down Before the Bell A late-day rally wasn't enough to bring the U.S. stock market indexes into the black on the day.  In fact, this is the first down week that the U.S. stock market has had in 2019. Something tells me it's certainly not going to be the last. The market was down from the bell this morning. Even before the bell, if you look at the futures, even before we got the jobs number - the February jobs report (which I will get into a little later in this podcast) the markets were already down.  The Dow Futures, I think were off about 125, 135, something like that. Normally, the markets are not making a big move in either direction before the jobs report comes out, because people don't know what the number is going to be, and generally it's a market-moving number, so the markets are typically pretty flat before we get the number. Trade Deal Up in the Air This time, the markets were down.  Based on rumors that the trade deal with China may be delayed.  People were talking about this Mar-a-Lago Summit that was going to take place later in the month, and now I was reading about how there may not be a deal in time, and the Chinese may not want to go to Mar-a-Lago, and so the whole thing is up in the air. So people were getting a little nervous about the trade deal. So that's why the markets were already selling off, plus, I think the Chinese markets had been weaker overnight. Trump or someone else Tweeted out that Trump had said, as soon as we signed the trade deal, the markets are really going to spike. Apparently, nobody has explained to Donald Trump how the stock market works. Buy the rumor sell the fact. Maybe the President has more experience in the real estate market, not understanding how the stock market generally anticipates news, and sells off on the realization of that news.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Wall of Overhead Resistance It looks like the correction in the U.S. stock market, and by correction I am referring to the rally, the first correction in what I believe is a new bear market - but it's looking like that correction may have finally run its course as the stock market has run into a wall of overhead resistance. In fact, the technical action on Monday was quite telling, because early in the morning we opened quite a bit higher - 100 points or so higher, and then had a 350-point reversal to the downside.  The catalyst for the initial rally was yet another rumor of an impending trade deal with China.  And it seems to me that we've basically run out of the ability to continue to rally the market by regurgitating the same news story over and over again. Now They've Sold the Last Rumor Remember I was saying that, when we actually have a trade deal, with China, my thinking would be it would be a "buy the rumor, sell the fact"?  Well the problem is, traders have already bought that rumor over and over again and that they may have already sold the last rumor. They can't wait for the fact.  They've just had so many rumors, that now they've sold the last rumor, and it doesn't even matter if we get a deal - the market is going to sell off.  Of course, if we get no deal at all, then the market could sell off even more, because a great deal has already been priced in to the market.  But there isn't going to be a great deal. There will be a deal, there will be nothing great about it; there will probably be nothing substantive about it. Expectations have been raised so high, which is another reason that I don't think Trump is as good a negotiator as he pretends.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Market Keeps Rallying on Regurgitated News The Dow Jones started off the final day of the week with a pretty strong rally; we were up a little better than 200 points earlier in the day.  Then we got some weaker than expected economic data which I will get to a bit later, and the market sold off.  The Dow never quite went negative, and then we rallied back and the Dow managed to end the week back above 26,000 with a 110 point gain. In fact all of the major indexes were positive on the day.  What caused the early morning rally was optimism, once again, that a trade deal with China is about to be signed, and it's kind of amazing how often the markets can bite on this and keep rallying on regurgitated news, because, we've heard this before. According to Trump the Chinese Are Going to Pay, but According to Economics, Americans Are Going to Pay As I have said on this podcast before, we are going to get a trade deal.  A trade deal with China is inevitable. The only positive about the trade deal is going to be that it takes the prospect of a self-inflicted wound off the table. That's the only good thing.  If we have a trade deal, then Trump is not going to increase tariffs on American businesses and on American consumers. That is the empty threat that is out there:  "Hey, we're going to force China to the negotiation table because, if they don't, we're going to erect these tariffs, which, according to Trump the Chinese are going to pay, but according to economics, Americans are going to pay. That's one of the reasons that we can't afford to actually use this weapon that we are threatening the Chinese with. Promising the Moon In fact, one of the reasons that you had all this optimism about this new deal was Larry Kudlow was out talking about how great the new deal is going to be - how this is going to be a huge win for America, it's a fantastic deal, it's a boon, it's better than we could have expected, it is all-encompassing... He has really raised expectations. Doesn't Kudlow know anything about the expectation game?  The idea is to under-promise so you can over-deliver. It seems like we're destined for failure here because everybody in the Trump administration is promising the moon.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Jerome Powell Wades into the Deficit Debate This year Fed chairman Jerome Powell made his obligatory visit to Capital Hill, where he spoke to Senators and Representatives about monetary policy.  Of course, this really just amounts to a press conference for Democrats and Republicans to either talk up the economy or talk down the economy, depending on who's got the White House.  Trump is the President, so you have a lot of Democrats trying to talk about why the economy is actually weak and trying to get the Fed Chairman to say something negative about the economy, or negative about President Trump.  And, of course you have the Republicans trying to get Powell to validate how great the economy is, and how Trump's policies are helping the economy. Republicans Aren't Willing to Recognize Problems The biggest problem with all this is that the biggest promoters of how great the economy is are the Republicans. These are supposedly the defenders of capitalism and they're saying everything is great, everything is booming, and you have the Democrats, particularly the Democratic Socialists saying that there are a lot of problems.  And the Republicans are saying that these problems don't exist. Democratic Socialists Have no Idea Why the Economy is Screwed Up Unfortunately, when it hits the fan, when we end up in a recession, and I've been making this point over and over again, Capitalism is going to be thoroughly discredited because the people who advocate it were oblivious to the problems. They said everything was fine. Now the Socialists will appear to be the ons who had it right - even though they were right for the wrong reasons. They have no idea why the economy is screwed up, and their plans to solve the problems will just screw it up even more. But the voters aren't going to know that. They're going to say, "Oh, these Republicans who talk about Capitalism, they were wrong. They didn't realize what a mess it was.  These Democratic Socialists, they knew there was a problem, so let's vote for them." Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Another "Greatest Deal Ever" 'The Dow rose a little over 180 points today, closing above 26,000 -26,031.81, to be exact, for the first time during this bear market rally.  I still believe that we are in a bear market rally, not a new bull market. the catalyst for today for today's stock market strength, and it was across the board; the markets were strong from the opening bell to the closing bell.  I think the high in the Dow was maybe just above 200; we sold off intra-day.  But the NASDAQ, the Russell 2000 were also higher on, again, optimism that there is going to be a trade deal between the U.S. and China.  Donald Trump is saying that he is negotiating the greatest deal ever, which is something that I have been saying, regardless of what the deal ends up being, Trump is going to say "It is the Greatest Deal Ever". What Helps China Is an Appreciating Yuan But there was a lot of attention being paid to the deal, a lot of stories coming out that were close to a deal.  In fact, I read that they do have a agreement on exchange rates.  Currencies, obviously the U.S. likes to accuse China of being a currency manipulator, and so maybe there's some type of deal that says they won't manipulate their currency - they won't use their currency as a weapon. Which is something China wasn't going to do, anyway. To the extent that we win any concessions from the Chinese, where they agree not to weaken their currency, that basically amounts to nothing. In fact, a weak currency is bad for China.  What helps China is an appreciating Yuan. Today's "Fedspeak" on Inflation More important than the talk about the trade deal was a lot of  "Fedspeak" today.  You had a lot of Fed officials that were talking; James Bullard, Clarida, John Williams - they were all talking.  The real common theme today was inflation. I have been talking about this for years.  How was the Federal Reserve going to basically respond to inflation above their 2% target? The real rate of inflation has probably been above 2%, in fact I'm confident that it's been above 2% every year.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ FOMC Minutes Describe Abrupt About-Face This afternoon we got the minutes from the last Federal Open Market Committee meeting which took place a few weeks ago.  This was the meeting where the Federal Reserve did what is now being described as probably the biggest policy shift in the history of the Fed. This was really an abrupt about-face, where they went from "Everything is great; we're going to keep on raising interest rates, and we are on auto-pilot - we are going to let the balance sheet continue to decline."  All of a sudden, now they're "patient", meaning they're not going to raise rates at all in the foreseeable future, and not only is the balance sheet reduction program no longer on auto pilot, but it is now going to end prematurely sometime this year. Fed Balance Sheet North of $4 Trillion Of course, the balance sheet is still north of $4 trillion, and if the reduction program comes to an end this year, you're still going to be talking about a balance sheet $3.5 to $4 trillion in size.  This would mean that almost all of the mortgages and treasuries which the Federal Reserve purchased in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis as part of its Quantitative Easing Programs, 1,2&3.  Almost all of that debt will remain on its balance sheet after the Fed has finished shrinking it.  Also, FOMC officials are now talking about Quantitative Easing once again as just another tool in the Fed's tool box. It's no longer something that will pulled out for an emergency, it's just going to be a normal policy tool for the Fed to deal with recession.  Of course, that's going to be their main tool, given that this next recession is going to start when interest rates are at 2.25%. So there is not a lot of room for the Fed to try to artificially stimulate the economy when it hardly has any room to reduce rates. Quantitative Easing is Debt Monetization Of course, what does that mean about the Fed's balance sheet? That means the balance sheet will ultimately be much higher than it was when it began its current Operation Quantitative Tightening. We will be higher than we were before it started. All this does is confirm what I've been saying all along, that Quantitative Easing is Debt Monetization.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

RATE AND REVIEW this podcast on Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/PeterSchiff/reviews/ Market Rallies on Old News The U.S. stock market continues to rally on basically the exact same news story that keeps on getting replayed.  Today, it was the absence of another government shutdown.  I guess now, this is final when it comes to no more government shutdowns, although that should have been obvious to everybody when Trump caved the last time and decided to pay everybody and temporarily end the shutdown. I said on my podcast at that time that that was it; that there was no way that there was going to be another government shutdown - yet the market continues to celebrate when they think that the shutdown's not going to happen. A National Emergency for the Wall Well now they know for sure it's not going to happen.  Everything's signed, it's a done deal and Trump is getting his wall anyway because he has now declared a national emergency, and so now because it's a national emergency, we are now going to pull these funds from other parts of the budget and we are going to build the wall. The National Debt is the Real National Emergency Of course, the real national emergency is not the lack of a wall, the failure to build the wall, but building up the national debt. The $22 trillion national debt.  We eclipsed that dubious milestone earlier in the week.  And again, when you talk about the national debt at $22 trillion, we're talking about the tip of a huge iceberg. This is just the funded portion of the debt.  This is where the U.S. sells a bond and somebody owns that bond. The Tip of the Iceberg It doesn't include liabilities like what the government owes for Social Security, or guaranteed bank deposits, or mortgages or student loans - that's not there.  Those are contingent liabilities.  They're just as real. They're not even part of the national debt. So, when you look at all the liabilities that the U.S. government is on the hook for, you're talking about well over $100 trillion - so $20 trillion is maybe d5 or 10 percent of the debt. But that debt is the real national emergency.Our Sponsors:* Check out FRE and use my code LISTEN20 for a great deal: https://frepouch.com* Check out Infinite Epigenetics: https://infiniteepigenetics.com/GOLD* Check out Justin Wine and use my code SCHIFF20 for a great deal: https://www.justinwine.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy