Outstanding breakdown of the EUCO loan mechanics. The conditionality you highight is genuinely bizzare - tying €90B repayment to a Ukrainian military victory that extracts reparations from Russia. That's not really a loan in any meaningful sense, more like fiscal theater that lets politicans tell voters they're being 'responsible' while effectively writing off the funds. I dunno how anyone expected this structure to pass basic scrutiny.
At present, the EU is drowning in debt & grasping at scraps to keep their pet project financed to harass The Rus, now that Uncle Sam has cut off free xfers of stolen American money to Z & his crew of psychopathic fraudsters...
Moreover, 2026 is certainly shaping up as a $hit$how for the EU/UK rentier noble liars (wonder how deep & wide the derivatives run), which according to many like Luongo (Seems to checkout), The newly minted "Core 4" (U$/CCP/Russia/Japan) are launching a banking/financial system to cut The City Of London & Brussels out of the scam they've been running for centuries by creating bonds backed by precious metals & industrial/consumer capacity.
It also looks that JPM has moved HQ back to NYC, taken their ma$$ive Ag reserves out of availability, that CME/COMEX may go the way of the dodo like LBMA as well...
Also, the newly created Tulsi Gabbard led NSS (go Tulsi!) is a seismic shift away from the cold war/neocon/neolib insane stratagems that have stirred up nothing but death, suffering & gnashing of teeth since the USSR ended (Paul Wolfowitz has entered the thread), but one has to wonder what the CIA/MI6/DGSE/BND/MOSSAD/Saudi GIP are going to do with their fun & games now?
Enquiring minds want to know...
Interesting times, which btw also includes Samsung's game changing Silver/Carbon SS battery tech, that will end the stupidity of Li-Ion battery tech & possibly create a valid future for EV+, although using a *lot* of Ag in the process.
A big question that 2026 will certainly answer is what about all things AI?
Let's hope some sanity is finally returning, although presently (as John's excellent roundup shows) there are some horrifically monstrous actors harming absolutely innocent members of "humanity" ~ Pray for Truth, Justice & The Righteous To End Tyranny.
Anyways, Merry Christmas everyone!
Pray. For. Peace.
Pray. For. Spiritual. Sanity.
God. Help. The. Children!
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; As I have loved you, that you also love one another."
I hope you and your family enjoy a festive Christmas and NewYear's season replete with vegetables from the garden. Thank you for your persistent efforts this year to keep your tribe of readers informed.
Merry Christmas Freshquest. It is shorts & t-shirt weather in San Antonio today, and we are heading out to Yoakum today after the big extended family Christmas Eve party last night.
All the best this Christmas day to you sir and family as well as all that stop here. What the hell am I doing here? You may well ask. I'm between tasks as we get set up for the meal a little later today. So a little reading is in order.
Does the following:"further American interests" from the cut below not make all that is stated before it null and void? If the statement stopped at "individual sovereignty" it wouldn't seem so contradictory.
“We stand for the sovereign rights of nations, against the sovereignty-sapping incursions of the most intrusive transnational organizations, and for reforming those institutions so that they assist rather than hinder individual sovereignty and further American interests.”
Merry Christmas. We had a tamale making party here at my daughter's house yesterday, then the big Cardenas family Christmas Eve party. Christmas in San Antonio winds down after midnight in this tradition. My older son and I had a nice exercise walk and talk this morning, and grandkids are passing developmental milestones...
What is totally laughable about the 'NSS25' statement is that nonsense about 'recognising the primacy of nations'.
That would mean an immediate sacking for the numpty saying that Greenland should be given to the USA, completely disregarding the primacy of Greenland citizens. We all know that the USA wants to loot minerals from Greenland....
Then there are the threats made by the mobster Trump to elected leaders of Caribbean and South American nations. There is zero respect for the primacy of Venezuelan oil.
It's getting very hard to respect the USA in any way whatsoever and if it wishes to break up the EU, then it is entirely appropriate that the USA is broken up into 50 constituent 'nation states' too. Don't think we'd see the State of Texas going to war in the Middle East now, would we?
I'm not an EU supporter in any way, but I do not defer to the USA in any way about how the world should be run, when the USA has been the world's premier imperialistic murderer since 1948.
I'm also seeing that Greenland is a buffer against a hostile western Europe.
Yes, the "white man's burden" once born by the British empire, especially the "Tommies", is now to be born by some iteration of the western financial empire, presumably born by "deplorable" white, black and hispanic males with no other employment...
2026 is supposed to be ayear that a lot breaks outright, and what we now see is frantic jokeying for position ahead of that event, since position at the start of a crash is the most important factor for how an antity fares in the crash.
It's still not "enough", is it? Fate, luck and the forces of history matter a lot.
This has a lot of reasons to be bigger than 1968, more like 1939, or even 1941...
"I'm also seeing that Greenland is a buffer against a hostile western Europe."
EU+UK+NATO = Cargo Cult (U$D+PMs+Industry+Weapons) following WWII when We The Sheeple were tricked into rebuilding their collapsed civilizations with the Marshall Plan.
Now that they're nutzo, again, we're not sending in anymore crate drops to keep their artificially supported madness has gone terminal...
LBMA just imploded trying to manipulate/suppress Silver today, in light trading, with spectularly horrific results (couldn't hold $75) ~ Just wait until the markets go back to heavy trading, now that almost everyone has cut City Of London off from physical holdings, with EU pensions et al. holding the bag?
Hopefully Trump pulled off some deep agreements with other C5 members, cause otherwise the bond markets go ka-blooey! next...
Batten down the hatches, the storm of all storms is about to hit!
Yes, Silver is traditional Chinese money, as Silver and Gold are traditional western money. Silver sits at $79.27 for the weekend and gold at $4533. It seems likely that there will be a big jump in physical silver prices before full trading opens in 2026. I'm remembering the Hunt Brothers, but they were trading on margin, and got smacked down by several changes in margin rules, which weakened their positions until they broke,
This is now physical for delivery making paper-silver irrelevant if it can't deliver.
This is the long overdue cra$h of western bullion scams & frauds being foisted upon humanity for 50+ years.
Modern civilization, all of it, is reliant on silver's conductivity.
The whole fake & gay manipulation (paper) can not stand in the face of physical shortage, once their game is called out...
We'll see what TPTB decide to do, but they've run out of options that won't make the situation worse, it's FAR past time that Ag holders/miners/refineries are paid their part in this brave new world of trillionaires that have playing them for chumps & marks.
Given how warm your weather is you must make time to get out and spin the. bottom bracket for. an hour or two - it will take your mind off troublesome world events.
I do that more in Austin and we are in Yoakum now, having driven from San Antonio to our rural redoubt. It is a pleasant town of 6000, and our place is near the outskirts. We hear people shooting on a nearby ranch sometimes, and cows mooing.
My older son and I had a brisk exercise walk this morning, and Jenny and I will get one, but she says she'd like to wait a little,"it's 79 degrees out there".
If true, there will be no war because it means the US is out of NATO and without the US there is no NATO... Consequently, NATO will not go war against Russia because they are both not strong enough and they have no money...
Well, you can observe that it is not simple and that we do not see all of the mechanisms at work, but finance is stressed and likely to take desperate actions before this is re-set.
"We have been given so much weaponry… because we perform the tasks set forth by the West, because we like to fight, and we like to kill,” Yevhen Karas, leader of the neo-Nazi terrorist organization C-14, said in early February 2022, before the war began:
Italian General Fabio Mini: "Ukraine was not attacked! Since 2014, Ukrainians, supported by the US and British, have been trying to start a war with Russia."
Now you see, hopefully, what the *ugly* truth actually is concerning what The Putin Rus are trying to stop.
That to date cuckservative media like WSJ, NY Post & Faux News, along with all the usual liberal proglodyte yellow journalists, are still supporting Ukraine should tell you *exactly* who & what they are in *real* reality (Operation Mockingbird 2.0)...
I really do hope Trump & Co. at the very least manage to pull us out of the Ukraine insanity, along with NATO + all the fake EU/UK allegiances...
Outstanding breakdown of the EUCO loan mechanics. The conditionality you highight is genuinely bizzare - tying €90B repayment to a Ukrainian military victory that extracts reparations from Russia. That's not really a loan in any meaningful sense, more like fiscal theater that lets politicans tell voters they're being 'responsible' while effectively writing off the funds. I dunno how anyone expected this structure to pass basic scrutiny.
Thank you Brother John,
At present, the EU is drowning in debt & grasping at scraps to keep their pet project financed to harass The Rus, now that Uncle Sam has cut off free xfers of stolen American money to Z & his crew of psychopathic fraudsters...
Moreover, 2026 is certainly shaping up as a $hit$how for the EU/UK rentier noble liars (wonder how deep & wide the derivatives run), which according to many like Luongo (Seems to checkout), The newly minted "Core 4" (U$/CCP/Russia/Japan) are launching a banking/financial system to cut The City Of London & Brussels out of the scam they've been running for centuries by creating bonds backed by precious metals & industrial/consumer capacity.
It also looks that JPM has moved HQ back to NYC, taken their ma$$ive Ag reserves out of availability, that CME/COMEX may go the way of the dodo like LBMA as well...
Also, the newly created Tulsi Gabbard led NSS (go Tulsi!) is a seismic shift away from the cold war/neocon/neolib insane stratagems that have stirred up nothing but death, suffering & gnashing of teeth since the USSR ended (Paul Wolfowitz has entered the thread), but one has to wonder what the CIA/MI6/DGSE/BND/MOSSAD/Saudi GIP are going to do with their fun & games now?
Enquiring minds want to know...
Interesting times, which btw also includes Samsung's game changing Silver/Carbon SS battery tech, that will end the stupidity of Li-Ion battery tech & possibly create a valid future for EV+, although using a *lot* of Ag in the process.
A big question that 2026 will certainly answer is what about all things AI?
Let's hope some sanity is finally returning, although presently (as John's excellent roundup shows) there are some horrifically monstrous actors harming absolutely innocent members of "humanity" ~ Pray for Truth, Justice & The Righteous To End Tyranny.
Anyways, Merry Christmas everyone!
Pray. For. Peace.
Pray. For. Spiritual. Sanity.
God. Help. The. Children!
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; As I have loved you, that you also love one another."
Merry Christmas.
Jesus told the disciples to love each other in the way that he had loved them, had taught them love. That is worth pondering.
Kicking the can a little; buying a little time before... something.
I hope you and your family enjoy a festive Christmas and NewYear's season replete with vegetables from the garden. Thank you for your persistent efforts this year to keep your tribe of readers informed.
Merry Christmas Freshquest. It is shorts & t-shirt weather in San Antonio today, and we are heading out to Yoakum today after the big extended family Christmas Eve party last night.
Wishing you the best for 2026.
All the best this Christmas day to you sir and family as well as all that stop here. What the hell am I doing here? You may well ask. I'm between tasks as we get set up for the meal a little later today. So a little reading is in order.
Does the following:"further American interests" from the cut below not make all that is stated before it null and void? If the statement stopped at "individual sovereignty" it wouldn't seem so contradictory.
“We stand for the sovereign rights of nations, against the sovereignty-sapping incursions of the most intrusive transnational organizations, and for reforming those institutions so that they assist rather than hinder individual sovereignty and further American interests.”
Merry Christmas. We had a tamale making party here at my daughter's house yesterday, then the big Cardenas family Christmas Eve party. Christmas in San Antonio winds down after midnight in this tradition. My older son and I had a nice exercise walk and talk this morning, and grandkids are passing developmental milestones...
;-)
One good topic deserves another, Killing People For Money:
1911: Procter & Gamble invents Crisco - hydrogenated cottonseed oil.
Problem: Nobody wants to cook with cottonseed oil. It's industrial waste used for making soap.
Solution: Marketing campaign to convince Americans that animal fats cause heart disease.
1948: American Heart Association is tiny organization with $1,700 budget.
Also 1948: Procter & Gamble donates $1.7 million to the American Heart Association.
The AHA suddenly becomes influential and well-funded.
1961: The AHA issues their first dietary guidelines: Avoid saturated fat. Use vegetable oils instead.
Recommended oils: Crisco and other vegetable oils.
Who benefits: Procter & Gamble.
Who funded the AHA: Procter & Gamble.
1980s: Trans fats (in Crisco and margarine) are discovered to be catastrophically unhealthy.
2015: Trans fats are finally banned as unsafe.
For 67 years, the American Heart Association recommended a product that:
Was invented as soap ingredient
Was made from industrial waste
Was later proven to cause heart disease
Was produced by their founding mega-donor
And they told you butter would kill you while recommending literal poison.
When trans fats were finally proven deadly, they quietly changed recommendations without acknowledging the millions who followed their advice.
No apologies. No accountability. Guidelines adjusted. Move on.
The organization you're told to trust for heart health was created by a soap company to sell industrial waste as food.
Science.
All credit for this national insanity, along with too many others to mention, belongs to Edward Bernays.
https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/135e15f3-4e72-4970-887b-fea9d8963984_2048x1108.jpeg
But it makes pie-crusts and croissants "flaky"
;-o
Yeah, cockroaches and rats won't eat Crisco, and it keeps forever.
No living thing eats Crisco; Boy Does It Last!
What is totally laughable about the 'NSS25' statement is that nonsense about 'recognising the primacy of nations'.
That would mean an immediate sacking for the numpty saying that Greenland should be given to the USA, completely disregarding the primacy of Greenland citizens. We all know that the USA wants to loot minerals from Greenland....
Then there are the threats made by the mobster Trump to elected leaders of Caribbean and South American nations. There is zero respect for the primacy of Venezuelan oil.
It's getting very hard to respect the USA in any way whatsoever and if it wishes to break up the EU, then it is entirely appropriate that the USA is broken up into 50 constituent 'nation states' too. Don't think we'd see the State of Texas going to war in the Middle East now, would we?
I'm not an EU supporter in any way, but I do not defer to the USA in any way about how the world should be run, when the USA has been the world's premier imperialistic murderer since 1948.
I'm also seeing that Greenland is a buffer against a hostile western Europe.
Yes, the "white man's burden" once born by the British empire, especially the "Tommies", is now to be born by some iteration of the western financial empire, presumably born by "deplorable" white, black and hispanic males with no other employment...
2026 is supposed to be ayear that a lot breaks outright, and what we now see is frantic jokeying for position ahead of that event, since position at the start of a crash is the most important factor for how an antity fares in the crash.
It's still not "enough", is it? Fate, luck and the forces of history matter a lot.
This has a lot of reasons to be bigger than 1968, more like 1939, or even 1941...
You and I have no "friends in high places".
"I'm also seeing that Greenland is a buffer against a hostile western Europe."
EU+UK+NATO = Cargo Cult (U$D+PMs+Industry+Weapons) following WWII when We The Sheeple were tricked into rebuilding their collapsed civilizations with the Marshall Plan.
Now that they're nutzo, again, we're not sending in anymore crate drops to keep their artificially supported madness has gone terminal...
LBMA just imploded trying to manipulate/suppress Silver today, in light trading, with spectularly horrific results (couldn't hold $75) ~ Just wait until the markets go back to heavy trading, now that almost everyone has cut City Of London off from physical holdings, with EU pensions et al. holding the bag?
Hopefully Trump pulled off some deep agreements with other C5 members, cause otherwise the bond markets go ka-blooey! next...
Batten down the hatches, the storm of all storms is about to hit!
As always, Words fail; Love is a Verb.
Yes, Silver is traditional Chinese money, as Silver and Gold are traditional western money. Silver sits at $79.27 for the weekend and gold at $4533. It seems likely that there will be a big jump in physical silver prices before full trading opens in 2026. I'm remembering the Hunt Brothers, but they were trading on margin, and got smacked down by several changes in margin rules, which weakened their positions until they broke,
This is now physical for delivery making paper-silver irrelevant if it can't deliver.
This isn't about re-monetizing Ag...
This is the long overdue cra$h of western bullion scams & frauds being foisted upon humanity for 50+ years.
Modern civilization, all of it, is reliant on silver's conductivity.
The whole fake & gay manipulation (paper) can not stand in the face of physical shortage, once their game is called out...
We'll see what TPTB decide to do, but they've run out of options that won't make the situation worse, it's FAR past time that Ag holders/miners/refineries are paid their part in this brave new world of trillionaires that have playing them for chumps & marks.
Got Ag?
It can be about severl things at one=ce, even many things, right?
Bitcoin can't persist and the AI bubble will pop.
There is no reason that gold and silver bubbles have to pop.
When they get big enough they become the new normal money.
Holders of bitcoin lose. Holders of silver shorts lose.
Who are the losers? Who are the winners?
Does this break the derivatives house of cards too? Who are the losers going to be? Who will the winners be?
Given how warm your weather is you must make time to get out and spin the. bottom bracket for. an hour or two - it will take your mind off troublesome world events.
I do that more in Austin and we are in Yoakum now, having driven from San Antonio to our rural redoubt. It is a pleasant town of 6000, and our place is near the outskirts. We hear people shooting on a nearby ranch sometimes, and cows mooing.
My older son and I had a brisk exercise walk this morning, and Jenny and I will get one, but she says she'd like to wait a little,"it's 79 degrees out there".
Contango?
No...Backwardation for you round eye!
Merry Christmas New York!
Merry Christmas London!
Merry Christmas Chicago!
Merry Christmas White House!
Sorry you can't be with your family today, you've got more important things to tend to...
So, what's a President gonna do when faced with checkmate!
Got Ag?
Maybe not "checkmate", but perhaps zugzwang, or maybe stalemate?
Hard to know without a few more moves, huh?
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G9GmWjNaMAAliA7.jpg?name=orig
"Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap."
Noble. Lie. Karma.
Buckle Up, Buttercup!
Didn't Zelensky's government just collapsed?
If true, there will be no war because it means the US is out of NATO and without the US there is no NATO... Consequently, NATO will not go war against Russia because they are both not strong enough and they have no money...
Simple...
Well, you can observe that it is not simple and that we do not see all of the mechanisms at work, but finance is stressed and likely to take desperate actions before this is re-set.
And, on topic for this post, I present:
"We have been given so much weaponry… because we perform the tasks set forth by the West, because we like to fight, and we like to kill,” Yevhen Karas, leader of the neo-Nazi terrorist organization C-14, said in early February 2022, before the war began:
https://video.twimg.com/amplify_video/1940405097026007040/vid/avc1/426x240/Gua1PNikGWm-7azM.mp4
Italian General Fabio Mini: "Ukraine was not attacked! Since 2014, Ukrainians, supported by the US and British, have been trying to start a war with Russia."
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1940266399944830976/pu/vid/avc1/576x1024/xbs8HXuuC6ip17w0.mp4
Now you see, hopefully, what the *ugly* truth actually is concerning what The Putin Rus are trying to stop.
That to date cuckservative media like WSJ, NY Post & Faux News, along with all the usual liberal proglodyte yellow journalists, are still supporting Ukraine should tell you *exactly* who & what they are in *real* reality (Operation Mockingbird 2.0)...
I really do hope Trump & Co. at the very least manage to pull us out of the Ukraine insanity, along with NATO + all the fake EU/UK allegiances...
Happy 2026!