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Welcome.
My name is Chris Martenson. I'm not an economist. I'm a trained research scientist, and a former Fortune 300 VP. Most importantly, though, I'm a concerned citizen.
I think the next twenty years are going to look very different from the last twenty years. This site is my attempt to explain why.
You should start with the Crash Course. This series of videos is, I think, the clearest and most straightforward explanation of how our economy, energy systems and environment interact -- how we got to where we are today, and some reasonable expectations for the future.
Thanks for visiting my site, and hope to see you back here often.
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The Implications and Fallout of the IEA "Leaks"
I had a number of requests to make this particular Insider post (for enrolled members) from Wednesday public.
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There was a huge amount of press and follow-up to the Guardian article of the leaks. This theme is important enough to continue exploring. Anybody who has seen the Crash Course does not need any more information about Peak Oil itself.
Instead, I am most fixated on when a tipping point in global awareness about Peak Oil might occur. That's why this revelation and all the press it has been getting has been extremely interesting to me.
The first article helps to provide some more context and backing for the 'leaks,' which turn out not to have been very original leaks, since others were told this same information as early as 2007. read more »
- cmartenson's blog
- 31 comments
- 6971 reads
Daily Digest - November 20
- Country At A Crossroads
- Inflation, High Taxation or Default
- Gun sales shoot up amid America’s fear of rising crime and terrorism
- Rep. DeFazio: Fire 'Timmy' Geithner
- Gold's 'Money' Value is $4,000 to $11,000: Market Strategist
- Biden On The Bailout: Socialism For The Rich, Capitalism For The Poor
- Student Fee Hike Fuels Mass Protest At UCLA
- Housing Crisis Hits A Whole New Level
- Breaking Down Fannie Mae's Deed For Lease Program
- Judge Rules Gov't May Be Liable For Billions In Katrina Claims
- Food Banks Struggle Amid Record Demands
- Maine's New Wind Plant Goes Online
- Houston Launches Program For Electric Car-Charging Stations
- Clean Green Texas
- New Twist In Vertical Gardening: 'Edible Walls'
- DailyDigest's blog
- 6 comments
- 2192 reads
Martenson Insider - Fed POMO activity and the Stock Market
Today, again, we receive news that Fed is continuing to pour more and more POMO money into the banking system, this time with a 'mere' ~$2 billion addition.
August 7 - New York Fed purchases $1.937 billion in agency coupons
As long-time readers here know, I have been tracking the Permanent Open Market Operations (or "POMO") activity of the Fed for a long time.
As I wrote in The Five Horsemen ( May 31 2009, enrollment required $):
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Risk Increases - The Flood Continues 
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Monday, November 9, 2009
I've long been cautioning that there are no historical parallels to the present that could guide us on whether inflation or deflation is going to dominate the next investment horizon. I've recently spent some time arguing that deflationists may have overlooked the impact of allowing financial companies to ignore their losses and pretend that they did not exist.
Even further back, I warned that the signs we were seeing were most consistent with a liquidity flood, which I encourage you to re-read, as it can explain much about where we are headed. I will build on this theme in this report.
Briefly, the signs of a liquidity flood are a rise in those asset classes most subject to the effects of freshly printed money (stocks, bonds, and commodities), a continued expansion of an already bloated Fed balance sheet, and a return of a risk appetite to the investing world. These things all predictably accompany a flood of freshly printed money pouring out of the Federal Reserve.
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FDIC Is Broke - Now What?
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Sunday, August 16, 2009
Executive Summary
- With the most recent bank failures, the FDIC is out of funds.
- The FDIC is levying a one-time fee on member banks to cover the shortfall, but it will not be enough and it punishes the prudent.
- The FDIC has been suspiciously slow at shutting down banks that have admittedly already failed.
- Banks have been allowed to overestimate the actual worth of their assets using "mark-to-fantasy" accounting.
- Hundreds of banks are likely already mortally wounded and set to fail.
- The FDIC means well, but creates a moral hazard the effects of which now haunt us.
- Take prudent action: Choose only high-rated banks, and keep cash out of the bank.
Five more banks failed this week, resulting in a long weekend for the FDIC (see below). The largest of these, by far, was Colonial Bank, which will cost the FDIC some $2.8 billion. And that's assuming that their loss estimates pan out as expected and that the $15 billion in shaky assets on which the FDIC will share future losses do not turn into larger-than-expected losses.
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