Subprime Democracy

Raise your glass to the hard-working people
Let’s drink to the uncounted heads
Let’s think of the wavering millions
Who need leading but get gamblers instead

Spare a thought for the stay-at-home voter
His empty eyes gaze at strange beauty shows
And a parade of the gray-suited grafters
A choice of cancer or polio

—Salt of the Earth, Rolling Stones

We have said goodbye to 2024. Now, let us try to dope out the new year. But first, a yellow warning light appears. Breitbart:

Credit Card Defaults Spike to Highest Level Since Aftermath of 2008 Financial Crisis

Credit card lenders wrote off $46 billion in delinquent loan balances in the first three quarters of 2024, a 50 percent increase from the same period last year. These forms of write-offs are viewed as a highly monitored measure of loan distress. This is the highest level since 2010, according to industry data gathered by BankRegData. Mark Zandi, the head of Moody’s Analytics, said, “High-income households are fine, but the bottom third of US consumers are tapped out. Their savings rate right now is zero.”

What? Isn’t this the world’s greatest economy? Aren’t stocks near all-time peaks… and unemployment near all-time lows?

How could the working class be falling behind on its credit card payments?

All around us — except for the mainstream press, which is generally wrong about everything — upbeat commentary and popular euphoria invite optimism.. After all, Trump is soon back in the White House. Pete Hegseth is going to make our military more lethal than ever. ‘Border Czar’ Tom Homan is going to deport the rapists and killers back to Central America. Scott Bessent — a billionaire hedge fund manager — is sure to keep the economy humming along. And two of the world’s most clever billionaires — Musk and Ramaswamy — are going to make the feds more ‘efficient,’ thereby eliminating a $2 trillion annual deficit.

And yet, something is clearly going wrong.

While billionaires get richer, the uncounted heads… the wavering millions… are getting poorer. And what a coincidence; the rich also dominate Wall Street, the banking industry, the press, both political parties and the federal government.

We weren’t born yesterday. The feds produce nothing. So, every penny of federal spending (over $6 trillion in 2024) must come from The People. And every penny must go to other people… the people favored by the controlling elites. It is not surprising that they favor themselves.

Nothing new about this. But in the US, rascality seems to be entering a more flagrant phase… in which the outgoing president pardons his own son (after making an election promise not to do so)… and the incoming president rewards his powerful supporters with the top federal jobs.

In the beginning of a democratic republic, yes, politicians still pinched their secretary’s derrieres and skimmed money from public budgets. But at least they kept it quiet… and were generally ashamed when it came out.

Those old limits — both written and customary — kept those in power from taking too much from those not-in-power. Even kings and queens learned not to squeeze their subjects too hard, lest their own heads be put onto the chopping blocks. As Voltaire remarked, ‘the best form of government is a monarchy… with an occasional beheading.’

In a democracy, public executions of politicians are regrettably rare. As a deterrent, losing an election is not nearly as effective as losing a head. Besides, the system is so rigged up in favor of the ruling class that rarely do members of Congress lose their seats. In the most recent example, 96% of those up for election won another term, even though Congress has only a 15% approval rating. The voters have figured it out. Why bother to boot a scoundrel out of office, when another ‘grey suited grafter’ will just take his place?

We must now be arriving at some near-end stage of the democratic progress. The Constitution is ignored… deficits don’t matter… and the degenerates have become greedy and ruthless. Debt and inflation increase and real output goes down.

Federal appointees are no longer chosen on the basis of their competence, but on the degree of loyalty to the chief executive. That is, they are not expected to uphold the principles of the founders, but to find ways around the restraints in order to fulfill the Maximum Ruler’s agenda, whatever it is.

In a better system, a real leader… or a savvy monarch… would tell the people the truth — that the US is headed for bankruptcy. He would get out the chainsaw and hack away at federal spending until receipts equaled expenses.

But to everything there is a season. A time to be born and a time to die. We are somewhere in between. Too old to rock and roll; too young to die. America is not ready for a Milei-style revolution. Not ready for an American perestroika. Not ready for the chainsaw.

Instead, it chooses the gambler. He’ll want to keep the grift going for as long as possible, accumulating as much wealth and power as possible… while pushing the inevitable calamity as far as he can into the future.

We spare a thought for the salt of the earth…and hope for the best for the year ahead…

Stay tuned…

Regards,

Bill Bonner

Raise your glass to the hard-working people
Let’s drink to the uncounted heads
Let’s think of the wavering millions
Who need leading but get gamblers instead

Spare a thought for the stay-at-home voter
His empty eyes gaze at strange beauty shows
And a parade of the gray-suited grafters
A choice of cancer or polio

—Salt of the Earth, Rolling Stones

We have said goodbye to 2024. Now, let us try to dope out the new year. But first, a yellow warning light appears. Breitbart:

Credit Card Defaults Spike to Highest Level Since Aftermath of 2008 Financial Crisis

Credit card lenders wrote off $46 billion in delinquent loan balances in the first three quarters of 2024, a 50 percent increase from the same period last year. These forms of write-offs are viewed as a highly monitored measure of loan distress. This is the highest level since 2010, according to industry data gathered by BankRegData. Mark Zandi, the head of Moody’s Analytics, said, “High-income households are fine, but the bottom third of US consumers are tapped out. Their savings rate right now is zero.”

What? Isn’t this the world’s greatest economy? Aren’t stocks near all-time peaks… and unemployment near all-time lows?

How could the working class be falling behind on its credit card payments?

And yet, something is clearly going wrong.

In the beginning of a democratic republic, yes, politicians still pinched their secretary’s derrieres and skimmed money from public budgets. But at least they kept it quiet… and were generally ashamed when it came out.

We spare a thought for the salt of the earth…and hope for the best for the year ahead…

Stay tuned…

Regards,

Bill Bonner

Private equity tends to perform better than the stock market, provided you do so over time.

Private credit, a newer asset class but a rapidly growing one, also shows strong returns, as well as relatively high current income.

And if you have a retirement account, chances are you’re willing to think long-term.

Win-win, right? Not necessarily.

First, these new funds would also come with an incentive structure similar to investing in a hedge fund. That includes a higher fee than a market index ETF – think 2% compared to 0.1% (or less).

Plus, many of these funds have a hurdle rate attached to them as well. Once they clear 5% returns – which, with private credit, can be easily cleared by making deals with cash returns over 5% – additional incentive fees may kick in.

Several factors are likely at play here. Rising uncertainty over Trump’s tariff and trade policies – even though he’s largely walked those back.

A bigger factor? The rise of AI.

Many big tech companies have been making layoffs this year, citing increased productivity as a reason. For instance, Microsoft just announced another 9,000 in layoffs.

Of course, when an individual company announces layoffs, it’s usually bullish for shares. That company is doing the same – or more – with a smaller headcount. That’s lower costs and higher productivity.

But in a world where every company can lay off a sizable percentage of their staff, we have more unemployed consumers, who tend to cut back on spending.

Every catalyst feels plausible.

Bank fragility from unrealized losses. Stubbornly high interest rates are making refinancing a pain. AI-induced job cuts are hollowing out consumer demand. Another carry trade unwind like last summer or a geopolitical flare-up.

It’s all a messy pile of possibilities — any one of which could tip the balance.

It’s the kind of setup that would make a predictive AI model salivate.

Feed it inputs like these — jobs reports, interest rates, layoffs, debt levels — and it would likely start blinking red.

Over the next twelve months, roughly $9 trillion worth of existing US debt securities will mature; this was money that the government borrowed years ago… and will soon come due.

In theory the government has to pay that money back. Naturally they don’t have the funds to do so… so instead they’ll borrow new money to pay back the old loans… essentially refinancing $9 trillion worth of the national debt over the next twelve months.

So realistically they must sell ~$11 trillion in debt over the next twelve months: $9 trillion to refinance existing debt, plus another $2 trillion to cover this year’s budget deficit.

$11 trillion is an enormous amount of money… which means they’ll need every investor possible ready and willing to buy US government bonds.

And that’s a problem. Because right now, foreigners (which own a HUGE chunk of the debt) are aggressively backing away from US government bonds.