All Roads Lead to More Inflation

(Mike Gleason, Money Metals News Service) Amid a grim new forecast for the national debt, precious metals markets have been volatile recently.

The gold market found support at the $2,300 level last week and has remained well above that level for days.

Turning to silver, a big move on Thursday saw prices move solidly back above the $30 level, only to fall back sharply again today.

It’s not yet clear whether the metals are going to embark on a summer rally from here or get pushed back at overhead resistance levels. What is clear is that metals stand to appreciate further over time against depreciating fiat currency.

Although inflation pressures have eased slightly over the past two years, there has been no improvement in the federal government’s financial condition over that period. In fact, the fiscal outlook has only worsened.

This week, the Congressional Budget Office projected that this year’s budget deficit will be much larger than previously forecast. The bad news was summed up by The National Desk News.

National Desk News Report: 

The national debt continues to head in the wrong direction and at an accelerated pace. On Tuesday, the Congressional Budget Office released an updated report predicting the debt clock will hit and surpass the $56 trillion mark by 2034. At the moment, the debt remains just under $35 trillion. This comes as the U.S. continues to spend more money than it collects in taxes.

Sen. Mitt Romney: 

Continuing to spend massively more than we take in and add every year massively to the national debt will not go on forever, and unless we deal with it in a constructive way, we will have a financial catastrophe at some point. National Desk News Report: For 2024, the CBO predicts the U.S. will spend $1.9 trillion more than it brings in. That’s up from the initially predicted $1.6 trillion.

The disturbing new numbers put the lie to boasts by the Biden administration of deficit reduction. President Joe Biden and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen have repeatedly stated that at various times they have pushed through $1 trillion or as much as $3 trillion in deficit reductions.

But the CBO’s latest report lays bare that Biden administration spending priorities are the biggest drivers of deficit increases. For example, Joe Biden’s massive student loan forgiveness scheme, if fully implemented, will add $145 billion to the deficit.

All this comes at a time when federal revenues are actually up 5%. The previously enacted Trump tax cuts have arguably helped boost the tax base. The ballooning stock market has produced a windfall of capital gains revenue for Uncle Sam.

In any event, the government doesn’t suffer from a lack of funding. Its fiscal health suffers from a chronic excess of spending.

The spending problem won’t be fixed by raising taxes on the rich or by hiring another 10,000, 100,000, or 1 million new IRS agents to try to extract more revenue from the middle class. The deficits will persist, and the nation’s long-term fiscal outlook will continue to worsen until politicians in Washington admit they have a spending problem.

Of course, there is plenty of bipartisan blame to go around. Congress along with previous administrations have also failed to restrain discretionary outlays and have failed to put entitlement programs on a fiscally sustainable path.

But the situation is getting especially dire now given surging borrowing costs. For the first time in history, interest payments on the national debt will cost taxpayers over $1 trillion in a single year.

There is no politically viable solution in sight to the nation’s fiscal woes.

While the Biden administration continues to make up stories about deficit reduction, some Big Government proponents are openly admitting that the current system of borrowing and spending is untenable.

They want to be able to spend money they don’t have without having to borrow it into existence with interest obligations attached. They want the government to be able to cancel its own debt and go on to spend in unlimited quantities by simply creating new currency out of thin air.

Of course, this would be a recipe for hyperinflation. But similar results can be achieved under our current monetary system. The Federal Reserve can buy government bonds in unlimited quantities, thus giving the Treasury Department the capacity to continue borrowing in unlimited quantities.

The Fed’s implicit guarantee to prevent the government from defaulting is why politicians in Washington, D.C. don’t feel compelled to change their spending habits.

And it’s why currency depreciation – also known as inflation – is on track to become an even bigger problem in the years ahead.


Mike Gleason is a Director with Money Metals Exchange, a national precious metals dealer with over 500,000 customers. Gleason is a hard money advocate and a strong proponent of personal liberty, limited government, and the Austrian School of Economics. A graduate of the University of Florida, Gleason has extensive experience in management, sales, and logistics, as well as precious metals investing. He also puts his longtime broadcasting background to good use, hosting a weekly precious metals podcast since 2011, a program listened to by tens of thousands each week.

J6er Seeks Venue Change from DC Because He’s a Former FBI Agent

(Ken Silva, Headline USA) So far, no Jan. 6 defendant has been successful in moving his case outside of Washington DC. That has helped the Justice Department to rack up easy convictions with a liberal-skewing DC jury.

Undeterred by the other defendants, one J6 protestor made a novel argument earlier this month for a venue change from DC to his home state, Washington. The defendant, Jared Wise—who faces six charges stemming from the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Hill uprising—argued in a June 11 filing that he should be tried outside of DC because he’s a former FBI agent.

“The size of the jury pool is effectively further reduced in Mr. Wise’s case, as compared to other January 6th trials, by his ties to the community and his prior employment in the FBI,” Wise said.

“In the course of his work as an FBI agent, Mr. Wise worked closely with many different departments and agencies in Washington D.C., creating an extensive web of connections — direct and indirect, personal and professional. Notably, the Washington branch of the FBI, his former employer, is helping to investigate this case.”

According to Wise, nearly one-third of DC’s population works for the federal government when postal workers are counted—15,000 of them working on Capitol Hill.

“This means that prospective jurors are likely to have ties to, knowledge of, and strong opinions about Mr. Wise, his past work, the events of January 6th, or the witnesses called by the federal government at trial,” he said.

Wise, who also used to work for Project Veritas, also filed a slew of other motions this month seeking to have charges dismissed, an expert witness called, and to subpoena his FBI personnel file. The presiding judge has yet to rule on those motions.

According to an FBI affidavit accompanying the indictment, he entered the Capitol and exited through a broken window. He also yelled at officers: “You’re disgusting. You are the Nazi. You are the Gestapo. You can’t see it.

“Kill ’em! Kill ’em! Kill ’em!”

Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.

Pentagon Lost Track of Deadly Gain-of-Function Spending

(Headline USA) The Defense Department’s inspector general revealed this week that the DoD has no idea how much it has spent funding dangerous gain-of-function research in China.

The department’s Office of Inspector General released a partially redacted report on the matter Tuesday in response to a request from GOP senators that the agency track the amount of federal funds given either directly or indirectly to Chinese gain-of-function experiments.

Gain-of-function research is defined as research that enhances or adds a viral function by genetic recombination or manipulation. It has been established as fact that Chinese scientists were conducting gain-of-function research on various COVID strains when COVID-19 began to spread. Moreover, it’s been revealed that some of the first people to catch COVID-19 worked in the Wuhan lab in China, where the experiments were conducted.

The DoD’s inspector general sought to discover whether and where funds were spent on “research or experiments that could have reasonably resulted in the enhancement of any coronavirus, influenza, Nipah, Ebola, or other pathogen of pandemic potential or chimeric versions of such a virus or pathogen.”

However, the inspector general admitted that the total amount of U.S. taxpayer dollars spent on such research is impossible to determine.

The report could only account for seven awards granted to researchers in China or other foreign countries performing gain-of-function experiments, as well as $54 million awarded to EcoHealth Alliance, the U.S. nonprofit involved in the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s gain-of-function research at the time of the COVID-19 outbreak.

“The full extent of DOD funds provided to Chinese research laboratories or other foreign countries for research related to enhancement of pathogens of pandemic potential is unknown,” the report states.

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, one of the leading critics of the U.S.’s COVID response, blasted the Defense Department, arguing it shouldn’t have been funding deadly gain-of-function research by unaccountable Chinese scientists at all.

“The Biden DOD has lost track of how much money it has given to Chinese laboratories for ‘enhancing’ pathogens. Why is the answer to this question not ‘zero dollars’?” he wrote on X.

WATCH: Bombshell New Video Shows CIA Asset Casing the Capitol before 9/11 Attacks

(Ken Silva, Headline USA) Saudi Arabia’s involvement in 9/11 has been public information for decades, with numerous reports detailing how Saudi officials Fahad al-Thumairy and Omar al-Bayoumi allegedly assisted at least two of the hijackers ahead of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

However, for more than 20 years, the public has never actually viewed the crucial evidence—until now.

On Thursday night, 60 Minutes published the notorious video of al-Bayoumi “casing” Capitol Hill in June 1999—months before al-Qaeda made the decision to include Washington DC in its terrorist plot. Numerous investigators believe the Capitol building was the target of Flight 93, which instead crashed in Pennsylvania.

“I am transmitting these scenes to you from the heart of the American capital, Washington,” al-Bayoumi can be heard saying in the video, which was just unsealed in the long-running class-action lawsuits victims’ families have been litigating against the government of Saudi Arabia.

Former FBI agent and 9/11 investigator Richard Lambert told 60 Minutes he thinks the video shows al-Bayoumi casing the Capitol—as opposed to just shooting a tourism video, as the Saudi government has argued.

“One of first thing you see flying into DC is Washington monument, so if you know where other targets are in terms of the Washington monument, it helps guide you to your intended target,” Lambert said.

“I think he’s talking to his al-Qaeda handlers who tasked him with the pre-operation surveillance video of the intended target.”

Perhaps just as shocking as the video itself was 60 Minutes’ revelation that the FBI has had possession of the footage since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

“British police are believed to have turned over the video to the FBI shortly after 9/11,” said a 60 Minutes reporter. “Why, after more than 20 years, is it just now surfacing?”

While Thursday’s video was a major revelation, it didn’t tell the whole story.

Indeed, new evidence in recent years has suggested that not only was al-Bayoumi a Saudi agent working for Saudi Prince Bandar; he was also an asset of the CIA, which was, of course, once headed by George H.W. Bush. That information has been coming from the proceedings against 9/11 defendants at Guantanamo Bay.

According to Office of Military Commissions investigator Don Canestraro, at least two FBI agents told him that the CIA had attempted to recruit two of the hijackers as informants. The CIA was directing its recruiting efforts through al-Bayoumi, according to Canestraro.

Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.

Real Interest Rates and Why They Matter

(Mike Maharrey, Money Metals News Service) Since the Federal Reserve started raising interest rates, investors have enjoyed higher yields on cash socked away in money market accounts and bonds. Higher yields have created some headwinds for gold as well. Since gold is a non-yielding asset, many people assume they will do better with bonds, or even putting money in a savings account.

But it’s important not to take the interest rates you see advertised at face value. You need to determine the real interest rate before you make an investment decision.

How Do I Calculate the Real Interest Rate?

The real interest rate is simply the stated rate you see on the news adjusted for price inflation. 

To calculate the real interest rate, you take the quoted nominal rate and subtract CPI.

For example, let’s say a 10-year Treasury bond is yielding 4 percent. That seems like a pretty good return. But if the CPI is running at 3.5 percent, the real interest rate on that bond is only 0.5 percent (4-3.5=0.5). 

Note that in a low interest rate environment or if price inflation is particularly high, it is possible for real interest rates to go negative.

If that same 10-year Treasury is only yielding 3 percent and the CPI is 5 percent, your real interest rate is -2 percent. That means you will lose money in real terms if you buy and hold that bond (Assuming every remains static).

When making this calculation, it’s important to remember that price inflation is generally even worse than the CPI reveals. 

The government revised the CPI formula in the 1990s so that it understates the actual rise in prices. Based on the formula used in the 1970s, CPI is closer to double the official numbers. So, if the BLS reports a CPI of 3 percent, under the old formula, you’d be looking at CPI closer to 6 percent. 

If you fail to grasp the concept of real interest rates, you can easily get fooled by media headlines.

As the Fed began increasing interest rates to combat price inflation, bond yields began to climb. You immediately heard reports on mainstream financial networks about how this was “increasing the opportunity cost” of holding gold. Opportunity cost refers to the interest you could have earned if you had bought a bond instead of a bar of gold.

This is the reason gold started selling off every time we got hot CPI data. Everybody assumed the Fed would raise rates and keep them higher for longer, increasing the opportunity cost of holding gold even more. 

But even as pundits were telling everybody to sell gold, real interest rates were still deeply negative. And there is no “opportunity cost” when real rates are negative, even if nominal rates are going up.

Even today, bond yields are barely positive using the government’s CPI calculation.

The bottom line is it’s crucial to keep real interest rates in mind when you’re making borrowing or investing decisions. 


Mike Maharrey is a journalist and market analyst for MoneyMetals.com with over a decade of experience in precious metals. He holds a BS in accounting from the University of Kentucky and a BA in journalism from the University of South Florida.

Is China Hiding How Much Gold It Really Has?

(Mike Maharrey, Money Metals News Service) A few weeks ago, gold sold off on news that the People’s Bank of China didn’t add any gold to its reserves in May.

At the time, I called it a “kneejerk reaction,” and said the news wasn’t “a particularly good reason to sell gold.”

“The fact the PBoC didn’t buy any gold in May is certainly interesting, but it hardly counts as earthshaking news. Standing pat for one month doesn’t mean “China has stopped buying gold” as some news outlets framed it.” 

Before the news, China had bought gold for 18 straight months. It ranked as the biggest central bank gold buyer in 2023. Officially, the People’s Bank of China added more than 300 tons of gold to its reserves during its buying spree.

“Officially” is the keyword. 

Many analysts have long thought that China has far more gold than it officially reports. 

Jim Rickards pointed out on Mises Daily back in 2015 that many analysts believe that China keeps several thousand tons of gold “off the books” in a separate entity called the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE). 

The Official Chinese Gold Numbers Don’t Add Up 

Chen Long is the founder and lead economist for Plenum. He’s also a respected journalist who writes extensively about China’s economy, financial markets, and government policies. Long recently wrote a piece for ThinkChina, a Singapore-based news site, after he ran the numbers on China’s gold holdings.

He found the official numbers simply don’t line up.  

Long starts by pointing out that Chinese central bank gold purchases are a drop in the bucket compared to the country’s gold imports. The country imported over 1,400 tons of gold in 2023. This is despite the fact that China ranks as the world’s largest gold producer. Chinese mines dug up 375 tons of gold in 2023. 

In other words, there is a lot of gold flowing into China, and the country exports very little.

Only a handful of commercial banks hold licenses to import gold due to the PBoC’s tight regulation of the market. According to Long, 17 banks, including four state-owned institutions, reported gold holding of about 1,016 tons as of the end of 2023. 

Interestingly, gold holdings by these commercial banks have been falling since around 2016.

Meanwhile, many commercial banks in China no longer sell gold to the public due to a commodities scandal a few years ago.

When you dig into the numbers, total official gold holdings by the PBoC, retail buyers, and the big commercial banks only rose by 431 tons last year. Total gold imports and production came in at 1,775 tons. That’s a gap of more than 1,300 tons.

Over the last two years, there have been about 2,700 tons of gold that is unaccounted for.

So, where in the world did that gold go?

Long said, “It is common to see gaps between these figures, but they are usually within a few hundred tons at most. Such a huge gap is rare.”  

Where Is the Chinese Gold?

How do we account for this “missing” gold?

Long offered three possibilities.

Number one is that the People’s Bank of China bought more gold than it reported.

“If the PBoC has massively increased its gold position, it may want to withhold a full disclosure in order to avoid shocking the market.”

If all that missing gold is being held by the central bank, it would double its stated gold reserves to around 5,000 tons. 

Long notes that the Chinese central bank has delayed reporting before. In June 2015, the PBoC disclosed a one-off increase in gold reserves of 621 tons. It’s highly unlikely the central bank bought all that gold in a single month.

A second possibility is China’s sovereign wealth fund holds some of that missing gold.

A sovereign wealth fund is a state-owned investment fund that holds surplus government revenues.

“After all, the sovereign wealth fund may not want to put all its money in U.S. dollars either, but the China Investment Corporation does not disclose how much gold it owns,” Long said.

A third possibility is that other numbers have been fudged. Chinese commercial banks may have overstated the reduction in their gold holdings while household gold purchases were understated.

“While the domestic banks have reported a big reduction of gold assets, some investors may have turned to the foreign banks who also have gold import licenses. They may have increased their gold holdings without making disclosures, although we doubt that such increases could completely offset the decline of gold holdings at the Chinese banks.”

With the lack of transparency in China, we’ll probably never know exactly where the gold went.

As Chris Powell recently wrote, “Mainstream financial news organizations don’t yet seem to notice that official statements about gold reserves are, to put it politely, not reliable.”

That means we’ll never know for sure just how much gold the Chinese government and its central bank hold. But you don’t have to be a wild conspiracy theorist to think they probably have far more gold than they’re letting on.


Mike Maharrey is a journalist and market analyst for MoneyMetals.com with over a decade of experience in precious metals. He holds a BS in accounting from the University of Kentucky and a BA in journalism from the University of South Florida.

Democrat Judge Arrested for Attacking Police Officer at Ga. Nightclub

(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) An embattled Democrat judge in Georgia has been arrested for allegedly assaulting a police officer and refusing to identify herself at an Atlanta nightclub. 

Douglas County Probate Judge Christina J. Peterson faces charges of battery and felony obstruction after allegedly striking an officer on the head early Thursday morning, as reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 

Peterson was booked into Fulton County Jail with her bond set at $5,000. The incident occurred at the Red Martini Restaurant and Lounge on Peachtree Road, according to Newsweek. 

This arrest comes amid a damning investigation into Peterson’s judicial misconduct. 

The Georgia Judicial Qualifications Commission found her guilty of “systemic incompetence,” unanimously voting on 30 counts of misconduct in April. 

The commission determined that Peterson had violated courthouse rules, mistreated her staff and made inappropriate social media posts. 

One notable abuse involved the arrest of a woman who came to the courthouse to change her name on her marriage certificate.  

After an unspecified dispute, Peterson ordered the woman to serve 20 days in state prison. The woman was released two days later after her husband paid the fine, reported Newsweek. 

“Such a hasty and shockingly disproportionate reaction is the hallmark of [Peterson’s] intemperance,” the commission wrote, according to Newsweek. 

Additionally, Peterson was criticized for allowing a wedding to take place after business hours and for unnecessarily pressing a panic button. 

In response to the allegations, Peterson complained about not receiving recognition as a Black woman and a Democrat. 

“I’m the first African American female judge who was a Democrat,” she claimed. “I was never celebrated or congratulated.” 

Hollywood Hypocrisy: Video Urging Electors to Overturn Trump’s 2016 Victory Resurfaces

(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) As leftist prosecutors bring charges against individuals involved in alleged alternate electors in the 2020 election, a resurfaced video of Hollywood actors reveals a striking hypocrisy.  

The video, dating back to 2016, showed the actors pleading with the Electoral College to overturn Donald Trump’s victory against Hillary Clinton.

This video resurfaced at a time when Democrats are branding Republicans who questioned the 2020 election, which resulted in Joe Biden’s presidency, as undemocratic.

However, the 2016 campaign, led by Unite For America and featuring actors like Martin Sheen, Debra Messing, Bob Odenkirk, Moby, James Cromwell and B.D. Wong, exposed a stark contrast in their stance on democracy.

“Our founding fathers built the Electoral College to safeguard the American people from the dangers of a demagogue and to ensure that the presidency only goes to someone who is, to an eminent degree, endowed with the requisite qualifications,” Sheen claimed in the video. 

“You have the position, the authority and the opportunity to go down in the books as an American hero who changed the course of history, and you have my respect for your patriotism and service to the American people,” he added. 

According to the New York Post, the campaign urged the Electoral College to deny Trump the presidency, despite his 306 electoral votes.  

The actors implored electors not to vote for Trump, with Sheen emphasizing, “Any eligible person — no matter which party they belong to.” 

Fast forward to 2024, and several leftist prosecutors in at least five states have weaponized the justice system against Republicans for allegedly questioning the results of the 2020 election.  

Georgia initiated charges under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act against Trump and 18 co-defendants for an alleged alternate elector plan. 

Following Georgia’s lead, Michigan, Nevada, Wisconsin and Arizona—all led by Democrat prosecutors—have filed similar charges against Republicans. 

Pornhub to Red States: If Kids Can’t See Us, No One Can

(Dmytro “Henry” Aleksandrov, Headline USA) Pornhub made it clear that it wanted to groom children by announcing its plans to block access to its website in five conservative states — Indiana, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky and Nebraska — after they implemented age verification laws designed to prevent children from accessing pornographic websites.

To protest similar age verification laws that have quickly spread across conservative states, Pornhub cut off access to its website in more than half a dozen states, the Verge reported.

The pornographic industry also sued states like Indiana over the age verification laws.

A spokesperson for Aylo, Pornhub’s parent company, who asked to only be identified as Ian due to safety concerns, informed the news source that Kentucky would lose access to the website on June 10, 2024, Indiana, Idaho and Kansas would lose access on June 28, 2024, and Nebraska will lose access on July 17, 2024.

The blackout will apply to all of Aylo’s pornographic websites, which include more than a dozen other brands, Ian said.

Instead of admitting that the company is going after the kids, Aylo made up an excuse for why they will block access to the website in the state, instead of just blocking minors from seeing something that they are not supposed to see.

The parent company said it decided to block access to its websites over privacy concerns around the new laws since adults would need to upload some form of government ID to prove they’re adults.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation criticized the laws as “surveillance systems,” adding that they could lead to misuse or theft of sensitive data.

“This scheme would lead us further towards an internet where our private data is collected and sold by default,” the organization stated in 2023.

Aylo said it supports age verification but views the current laws as “ineffective, haphazard and dangerous.”

The news source reported that the company implemented ID-based age verification in Louisiana last year and said traffic dropped by 80% because, as expected, people would not want to expose themselves as regular porn watchers.

The policy would drive consumers to websites that don’t follow the law and may otherwise fail to moderate their content, the company argued.

“The world’s biggest porn site would rather stop doing business than prevent kids from watching. Quite telling!” Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire wrote.

As of June 20, 2024, Pornhub was banned in Texas, North Carolina, Montana, Mississippi, Virginia, Arkansas and Utah.

White, Male Disney VP Admits Company Won’t Hire White Men Anymore

(Dmytro “Henry” Aleksandrov, Headline USA) The O’Keefe Media Group released its new undercover video, in which Disney’s senior vice president and team lead admitted that the far-left company discriminates against white men.

Michael Giordano said the corporation discriminates against white men purely based on their race and sex, James O’Keefe revealed in his latest video.

The news came after multiple examples of anti-white- and anti-male rhetoric had infiltrated every major institution in this country, including entertainment, like movies and TV shows.

“I have friends in HR and I have friends in other divisions. And they’re like, ‘Look, nobody else is going to tell you this, Mike, but they’re not considering any white males for the job,’” Giordano told the undercover journalist.

He then mentioned how being a white man prevents him from being promoted.

“As far as Disney is concerned, I am a white male and that’s not who they’re looking to promote at the moment,” Giordano said.

The anti-white racism in the company became so blatant that even biracial people may not be hired for the job if they look too white.

“We wanted to hire somebody in the department… who was half black but didn’t like, appear half black and there was a creative executive who was like ‘We’re not, like, that’s not, that’s not what’s wanted.’ They wanted somebody in meetings who would appear a certain way and he wasn’t gonna bring that to the meeting,” he said.

Even though racism against white people is accepted and celebrated in this society, Disney still decided to avoid lawsuits by using euphemistic terminology.

“[The company allegedly uses] code words and buzzwords that are used to explain what they’re looking for… so it’s not like a legally actionable thing,” Giordano said, adding that Disney would eventually be sued for its shameless racism against white people.

Additionally, O’Keefe reported that the company awards bonuses to executives based on whether they recruited enough non-white employees.