Over the last year, energy stocks have traded well despite crude oil prices languishing. For instance, over the last six months, XLE, the energy ETF, has risen 14%, while crude oil prices have fallen by 12%. The two largest components of XLE, Exxon and Chevron, which account for 40% of the ETF, are up 30% […]
Bloomberg recently published “Wall Street Grapples With A New Risk: A European Buyers Strike.” The article notes that stock indexes in Europe, Japan, Canada, and South Korea are all beating US equities in both nominal and dollar terms. As a result, some European pension funds and other foreign buyers are trimming their exposure to US […]
On Monday, we discussed how the Truflation inflation gauge points to a sudden price decline, which clouds the reflation outlook. Today, we share recent consumer sentiment readings that counter the disinflation story and support the reflation narrative. On Friday, the University of Michigan reported that its consumer sentiment index improved in January to a five-month […]
With a 4.4% increase in economic growth in the third quarter and expectations that it could be higher in the fourth quarter, the so-called reflation narrative appears primed to dash out of the gates in 2026 at its current strong pace. The problem with assuming the reflation narrative will hold in 2026 is that it […]
Over the last few months, we have questioned the dollar debasement narrative. However, in this commentary, we suspend our views and assume that debasement is real and, further, that it fully explains why gold and silver are rising rapidly. The goal of this exercise is to use gold returns and math to find a fair […]
A Danish pension fund, Akademiker Pension, which manages roughly $25 billion in retirement assets for teachers, announced that it plans to sell all of its U.S. Treasury holdings by the end of January. Their action is a symbolic rebuke against rising tensions over Greenland’s sovereignty. The fund claims: The decision is rooted in the poor […]
It appears that President Trump wants Kevin Hassett to remain in his role at the White House. With the supposed frontrunner to replace Powell out of the running, the nomination now seems open to Kevin Warsh. As the graph below shows, Polymarket bettors are assigning 60% odds that Kevin Warsh will be nominated. Given this, […]
Supporting the dollar-debasement narrative is the claim that money supply growth is out of control. For instance, we saw a post claiming “US money creation is happening at an alarming pace.” Specifically, he says the money supply increased by $1.65 trillion in 2025. Quoting the money supply, as he does, in absolute dollar terms is […]
Bank of Japan (BOJ) officials are increasingly discussing the weak yen as a source of inflation. Their concern is that prolonged yen weakness raises import costs and encourages businesses to pass those costs on to consumers. Bear in mind that Japan imports almost 100% of its energy needs and a large portion of other essential […]