The past year was a difficult one overall for the metals, with the main standouts to the upside being a geopolitical risk-driven gain in gold, a China-driven rise in iron ore and a surge in uranium on broadening global support for nuclear power (Figure 1). A jump in global interest rates to near two-decade highs saw recession fears persist all year, and while one still did not actually eru...Read More

This year the post-global health crisis boom was brought to an end by a surge in inflation to forty-year highs, a major rise in global interest rates in an attempt to curb the rising prices and surging geopolitical risk after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. While precious metals held up reasonably well as markets turned to them as a risk hedge, by Q2/22 the higher interest rates put an end t...Read More

Chile is the world leader in copper production, at 28.5% of the total in 2020, and this looks set to continue, with the country having the largest global reserves, at 23.0% of total. It is also the global leader for molybdenum, which is often found along with copper, and is a major lithium player, holding 51.1% of global reserves. Read More

Newfoundland has become a gold exploration hotspot over the past few years, with the sector seeing some of its strongest activity ever. While the province remains a small contributor to Canadian gold production, it has a substantial mineral industry well supported by the government, focused on iron ore, copper and nickel, and the surge in exploration suggests that gold output from the...Read More

Nevada is the core of the U.S. gold output, accounting for by far the majority, at 75.4% on average for the past year. The state looks set to remain a dominant player in U.S. gold, as it accounts for 49% of total U.S. reserves, with Alaska slightly ahead with 51% of reserves, but just 8.6% of current production. The U.S. accounts for 6.1% of global gold output, making Nevada one of the largest gol...Read More

The Golden Triangle in northwestern British Columbia has historically been a major site of Canadian gold production, beginning as early as the mid 1800s. There was a wave of production in the 1990s which cooled as the gold price declined, but larger scale production resumed in 2017, and the area has seen surging exploration interest over the past year, given that the region has some of the largest...Read More

In this report we outline the Quebec gold mining industry, including its major producers, and a survey of many of the junior miners focused on the province. Quebec accounts for 34% of Canadian gold production (second to Ontario, with 44%) and remains a major focus for both producers and junior miners.Read More

Red Lake has been one of the most prolific gold mining districts in Canada and the world, with exploration having started in the 1920s, and production, which began in the 1930s, continuing to the present day. The district is known for the high grade of its gold, its infrastructure, and strong institutional support, given the long history of mining in the area.Read More

I suspect you thought that June 6, 1944, was D-Day, when U.S.-British-Canadian and other Allies invaded Normandy, France, eighty years ago today. Yes, I know that the event is called D-Day, but for reasons I'll explain in a moment, let's go with the letter "L." Bear with me...Who Put the "D" in D-Day?D-Day is a confusing label. There's no correct explanation for the letter "D," not now nor back on...Read More

Yesterday's reckoning drew a heaping mail.We reckoned that the United States contributed less to World War II victory than the Russian contribution.Thus we have offended the national pieties.We may as well have denounced the institution of motherhood, pies with apples in them and the Declaration of Independence.Reader K.K deals with us this way:What a lousy thing to write on D-Day. Any other day,...Read More

Eighty years ago this day the Allied powers massively raided the French beaches at Normandy.It was a superexcellent event the greatest maritime invasion in all of history.Its plotting, its organizing and its implementation remain astounding wonders.Over 4,000 Allied men fell down that day and never stood back up over half were American.Thousands and thousands more were slain in subsequent camp...Read More

I'm sure you recall the banking crisis of March to May 2023.It began with the collapse of the little-known Silvergate Bank on March 8. This was followed the next day by the collapse of the much larger Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) on March 9. SVB had over $120 billion in uninsured deposits.Bank deposits over $250,000 each are not covered by FDIC insurance. Those depositors stood to lose all their mone...Read More

Beware the sting in the tail.In the context of today's reckoning, beware the sting in the banking tail.Beginning March last year, the banking system absorbed a substantial clout.A score of regional banks sank to their knees... and plunged into receivership.By way of background:Their portfolios were loaded through with long-term Treasury bonds. The banks purchased these "safe" bonds in a period of...Read More

The steady path toward World War III continues. U.S. and NATO support for Ukraine in the war with Russia has been one long failure, but that hasn't stopped them from escalating the war with new weapons and tactics.Russia has met the escalation with its own escalation every step of the way. At what point do rational leaders in the West (if there are any left) pause, consider that the war is lost in...Read More

The full ramifications of the guilty verdict against Trump have yet to be felt. It was the first time in U.S. history that any president has been convicted of a crime during or after leaving office.Now Trump will have to run for president as a "convicted felon," which the media has been repeating over and over again. But so far the verdict seems to have benefitted Trump.Trump got a six-point jump...Read More

All hell broke loose on the New York Stock Exchange early Monday morning as traders slammed shares of Berkshire Hathaway, opting instead to gobble up GameStop calls as meme madness returned to the markets with a vengeance.OK, that story's not exactly true.But you have to admit this would be one of the most hilarious (and irrational) market narratives of all time. Imagine investors cratering Uncle...Read More

This contrarian sees a strong consensus around the notion that hyperinflation is the inevitable end-game of nation-states/central banks issuing fiat currencies, i.e. currencies that are not restrained by being pegged to tangible assets such as gold reserves.The temptation to issue (via “printing” or borrowing new currency into existence by selling sovereign bonds) more currency becomes...Read More

Thomas Jefferson would've pooped his pants if he saw what Congress is doing right now. There should be no such thing as fiscal dominance; fiscal policy should be frugal. Spend enough to keep the lights on and let the people drive the economy.Jefferson would've hated our Hamiltonian central bank as well, rap musicals be damned.But over the past few years, we’ve learned that printing money did...Read More

As you know by now, Donald Trump was found guilty yesterday on all felony counts in his hush money trial in New York.Sentencing in the case is scheduled for July 11, 2024. That's just four days before the Republican National Convention begins in Milwaukee on July 15. That's not a coincidence, by the way. It's calculated to further tarnish his image ahead of the convention.It's part of the pattern...Read More

"Stocks can't ignore the issue any longer."What is the issue stocks can no longer ignore? And why can they no longer ignore it?Answers shortly. First we look in on stocks themselves the stocks that can ignore the issue no longer.The Dow Jones absorbed a 330-point lacing today. The S&P 500, a 31-point blow. The Nasdaq Composite, meantime, went 183 points backward.Why? CNBC informs us that:Sto...Read More

This past weekend, Donald Trump spoke at the Libertarian Party's national convention. The media are gloating that the crowd booed Trump at times.But the fact that they gave Trump a cool reception shouldn't come as a surprise. Many libertarians (though not all) are for open borders. Trump wants a border wall. Libertarians doctrinally support unfettered free trade, while Trump believes in tariffs to...Read More

We all know about the non-stop lawfare attacks on Donald Trump. You might like Trump or hate him, but it shouldn't matter. Every American who cares about justice and the rule of law should be concerned about them.It corrodes the system of justice that's long been a source of national pride.Besides being a financial analyst, I'm also an attorney with a deep understanding of constitutional law. And...Read More

It is Memorial Day... when we pause to honor the nation's war dead.Most Americans will not, of course.It merely represents a chance to lie flat on a beach... to munch frankfurters... to dream the tall dreams of approaching summer.We will be among them.We will not be planting tiny American flags atop forgotten graves today.We will not be bugling taps.It is unlikely we will thank a veteran for his s...Read More

The sitting administration the Biden administration sobs about inflation.It claims it labors... heart and soul... to reduce that inflation.Yet we believe these tears are the crocodile's tears. That is, these tears are not authentic.We believe the administration is not heart and soul to reduce inflation.The administration is rather heart and soul for inflation. Not hyperinflation, mind you hy...Read More

A book that pays high returns for decades with endless insights is Joseph Schumpeter's Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (1942).It's not a systematic treatise. It's more of a series of observations about huge problems that vexed those times and ours. Many are informed by economics. Some by history. Some by sociology and culture.Schumpeter was a partisan of the old-school bourgeois order educat...Read More

We can summarize the changes in our economy over the past two generations with one word: precarity, as life for the bottom 90% of American households has become far more precarious over the past 40 years, despite the rising GDP and “wealth” as measured in phantom capital.This reality is expressed in the portmanteau word precariat, combining proletariat (someone whose livelihood comes f...Read More

For the past two years, I've been warning about the emergence of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), or as I like to call the U.S. version, "Biden Bucks."Can good old-fashioned American federalism stop them? We'll consider that possibility today.If you're a new reader who isn't familiar with Biden Bucks, or an existing reader who could use a reminder, the Biden administration is planning to c...Read More

The bulls continue their unstoppable run as stocks launch higher once again this week.The major averages are all fresh off new highs - and the US indexes aren't the only names on the list.In fact, 14 of the world's 20 largest stock markets have recently logged all-time highs, gushed Bloomberg shortly after the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 40,000 for the first time Friday afternoon. Ot...Read More