Shutdown Theatre

President Trump isn’t afraid to etch his name beside another government shutdown. The 2018–19 freeze, at 35 days, was the longest in U.S. history.

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The pattern is telling: shutdowns have grown longer over the decades, even if not rarer. Since 1976, there have been 20, lasting an average of eight days.

This week, funding runs out at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday. Republicans want a stopgap until Nov. 21. Democrats demand health-care subsidies and Medicaid money restored. Neither side blinks. Political hacks calculate the GOP lacks the 60 Senate votes to do it alone.

For Democrats, meanwhile, healthcare – specifically for undocumented immigrants, for some reason — is the hill they have chosen to fight on.

For Trump, the stalemate is an opening.

Agencies have been told to prepare furloughs, but also to consider permanent cuts. That’s the iceberg under the surface: not just a pause, but a chance to finish what DOGE only advised.

Gold’s Relentless Run

Gold notched its 38th record high this year. Futures are up 43% year-to-date — the best streak since 1979.

We note that even Investopedia is advertising ways to add gold and silver to your retirement portfolio now.

This month alone, gold has risen more than 10%.

The ineptitude of Congress and an impending shutdown only add fuel. “Gold is a refuge from political instability,” Steve Forbes reminded us again, “and economic uncertainty, inflation, deflation, and currency depreciation.”

A study covered by Bloomberg reports U.S. reserves are now “worth more than $1 trillion at current market prices.”

Officially, America’s hoard is worth only $11 billion. The Treasury still books them at $42.22 per ounce, the 1973 figure set when polyester ties were wide.

The discrepancy is comical. But it points to deeper stress.

Treasuries are being issued at a record pace to fund deficits. Dealers choke on the supply, repo markets flare, collateral chains fray. Sanctions — remember the freezing of a G20 country’s reserves in 2022 — pushed central banks into gold as the only sanction-proof store of value. Add structural supply constraints and China’s rising appetite, and the path of least resistance stays higher.

Another Kushner Play

Stocks climbed like ivy yesterday, modest but stubborn. Investors know the week ahead may bring no jobs report, no CPI print — a government shutdown will furlough workers and blackout data.

Electronic Arts kept its run alive, confirming its $55 billion take-private.

The deal — led by Jared Kushner’s group — would be the largest leveraged buyout ever. JPMorgan’s $20 billion financing is being called a “Wall Street victory” against the private credit industry. It also binds the gaming giant’s fate to debt markets at a time when liquidity is fickle.

Planes, Pain, and Chips

Airlines are losing altitude. Delta says business travel’s return can’t offset a tougher consumer economy; most U.S. carriers will lose money this year. Boeing is sketching the 737 Max’s successor even as safety fears linger from last year’s midair panel blowout.

Southwest has already shot itself in the foot by giving up all the practices that made it a standout in the industry: bags no longer fly free and getting flights changed with seat assignments is far more complicated than it used to be with its trademark cattle boarding process.

In other mainstream financial news, Google agreed to pay $24.5 million to settle Trump’s YouTube censorship claim, the Korean chip startup Rebellions raised $1.4 billion, while pandemic darling Anthology filed for bankruptcy.

The churn is relentless: one startup rises, another falls, always in the shadow of AI. Also reminiscent of the dotcoms two decades ago.

Tariffs on Timber, Movies, and More

Yesterday, Trump added softwood timber to his tariff arsenal — 10%. He floated more equity stake ideas in critical mineral producers.

And the headline grabber: a 100% tariff on foreign-made films, plus “substantial tariffs” on furniture.

“Our movie-making business has been stolen… like stealing candy from a baby,” Trump posted. No word yet on carveouts for AI actresses like Tilly Norwood, the eerily human performer whose agents now pitch her as “the next Scarlett Johansson.”

Hollywood veterans aren’t charmed. Whoopi Goldberg scoffed: “AI actors can’t replicate human performance.”

996 Comes to Silicon Valley

Work culture once meant happy hours and free kombucha. Now it’s “996”—9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week. Startups openly advertise 70-hour weeks. “Why would I go drink at a bar if I can be building a company?” a 23-year-old founder told The Wall Street Journal.

Ramp’s card data shows Saturday lunches rising in San Francisco; desks replace dancefloors. Google’s CEO calls for 60-hour weeks. Eric Schmidt says tradeoffs are needed to compete with China. But in China, 996 already proved deadly. After a 22-year-old woman collapsed after midnight overtime, regulators banned it — though weakly enforced.

Short term, the grind may yield products. Long term, it risks bodies. The line between hustle and harm is thin.

Butter at the Top

The Cantillon Effect, dressed in dairy: we observed last week, high earners tilt the scales for consumer spending. While shoppers pinch pennies on coffee and syrup, sales of premium butter surged by double digits last year.

Regular butter rose just 1.1%. But what’s this?

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Aficionados say posh butter “sits on the tongue a little more.” Others discovered it on European vacations. There’s also a backlash, led by RFK’s health secretary, against margarine and ultra-processed foods.

The world is “losing its mind about butter,” Bloomberg analysts exclaim.

Today’s market news is relatively simple. Premium butter is noise. Gold’s surge is a signal. History offers the rhyme: in the 1930s, Roosevelt revalued gold higher to recapitalize the system. Investors are now front-running the possibility of similar moves.

~Addison

P.S.: Grey Swan Live! returns this Thursday at 2 p.m. ET with Mark Jeftovic. We’ll have much to discuss with the latest government shutdown, gold’s historic rise, a possible bitcoin correction in 2026, and more. Make sure you’re a member… and make sure Live! is on your calendar. More details to come.

If you have any questions for us about the market, send them our way now to: Feedback@GreySwanFraternity.com.

President Trump isn’t afraid to etch his name beside another government shutdown. The 2018–19 freeze, at 35 days, was the longest in U.S. history.

Turn Your Images On

The pattern is telling: shutdowns have grown longer over the decades, even if not rarer. Since 1976, there have been 20, lasting an average of eight days.

For Democrats, meanwhile, healthcare – specifically for undocumented immigrants, for some reason — is the hill they have chosen to fight on.

For Trump, the stalemate is an opening.

Agencies have been told to prepare furloughs, but also to consider permanent cuts. That’s the iceberg under the surface: not just a pause, but a chance to finish what DOGE only advised.

Gold’s Relentless Run

Gold notched its 38th record high this year. Futures are up 43% year-to-date — the best streak since 1979.

We note that even Investopedia is advertising ways to add gold and silver to your retirement portfolio now.

This month alone, gold has risen more than 10%.

A study covered by Bloomberg reports U.S. reserves are now “worth more than $1 trillion at current market prices.”

Officially, America’s hoard is worth only $11 billion. The Treasury still books them at $42.22 per ounce, the 1973 figure set when polyester ties were wide.

The discrepancy is comical. But it points to deeper stress.

Another Kushner Play

Stocks climbed like ivy yesterday, modest but stubborn. Investors know the week ahead may bring no jobs report, no CPI print — a government shutdown will furlough workers and blackout data.

Electronic Arts kept its run alive, confirming its $55 billion take-private.

Planes, Pain, and Chips

The churn is relentless: one startup rises, another falls, always in the shadow of AI. Also reminiscent of the dotcoms two decades ago.

Tariffs on Timber, Movies, and More

Yesterday, Trump added softwood timber to his tariff arsenal — 10%. He floated more equity stake ideas in critical mineral producers.

And the headline grabber: a 100% tariff on foreign-made films, plus “substantial tariffs” on furniture.

Hollywood veterans aren’t charmed. Whoopi Goldberg scoffed: “AI actors can’t replicate human performance.”

996 Comes to Silicon Valley

Short term, the grind may yield products. Long term, it risks bodies. The line between hustle and harm is thin.

Butter at the Top

Regular butter rose just 1.1%. But what’s this?

Turn Your Images On

The world is “losing its mind about butter,” Bloomberg analysts exclaim.

~Addison

If you have any questions for us about the market, send them our way now to: Feedback@GreySwanFraternity.com.

The NYSE Arca Gold Miners Index is up 123% this year, the best this century.

The last time gold ran this hot — 1979 — savers stood in lines that wrapped around city blocks, waiting hours for Krugerrands and Maple Leafs. Fathers pulled kids out of school to get in line before the shop sold out. Dealers locked their doors mid-afternoon, unable to meet the demand.

It was less of an investment than survival. Inflation made cash a wasting asset, and gold was the last refuge.

We don’t want to see that again.

Gold is best as ballast — steady, weighty, tethering a portfolio to something real. When it turns into the object of a mania, it means we’ve entered the debt crisis of which we’ve long been wary.

The cost to ship cars, refrigerators, and Christmas toys has fallen back to numbers we last saw when the economy was on lockdown.

For these rates to rise, demand for goods needs to rise…. unlikely as President Trump’s tariff strategy is intended to reshore domestic production of these goods in the U.S.

Until factories come online, there will be fewer goods on the shelves. Combined with declining jobs and stubborn inflation, however, that fact may go unnoticed this holiday season.

We’ve been saying for a long time that when it came time to rev up the money printer again, the Fed would do it under some other rubric than “Quantitative Easing” (QE), because by now, everybody knows what that is. YCC? Not so much.

What it means is that the Fed will buy unlimited bonds out at the long end of the yield curve in order to keep yields under some arbitrary line in the sand.

Let’s see, now that the government is shut down, where are we?

Pretty much where we left off: Markets surging higher, backed by the weight of AI capex and gorging on debt; A Congress unable to pay for promises forged in the 20th century’s welfare bureaucracy; A currency bleeding purchasing power with each deficit skirmish; A nation where even butter, coffee, and bandwidth become weapons of policy.

The NYSE Arca Gold Miners Index is up 123% this year, the best this century.

It was less of an investment than survival. Inflation made cash a wasting asset, and gold was the last refuge.

We don’t want to see that again.

The cost to ship cars, refrigerators, and Christmas toys has fallen back to numbers we last saw when the economy was on lockdown.

For these rates to rise, demand for goods needs to rise…. unlikely as President Trump’s tariff strategy is intended to reshore domestic production of these goods in the U.S.

Until factories come online, there will be fewer goods on the shelves. Combined with declining jobs and stubborn inflation, however, that fact may go unnoticed this holiday season.

What it means is that the Fed will buy unlimited bonds out at the long end of the yield curve in order to keep yields under some arbitrary line in the sand.

Let’s see, now that the government is shut down, where are we?