Some crazy things MAY be happening in Europe.

 I read a post on Facebook that a few countries can technically foreclose on your house if you cant pay your utility bill.  Of course this is all gossip so many people are asking around and asking various law firms if you CAN really do it and what are the odds companies really will do this.

The reason for all this speculation is because of the recent talk of YOU WILL OWN NOTHING AND BE HAPPY, is this how it will unfold? 

Is this the start of the GREAT RESET, that people are talking about?

I dont know and its hard to believe this will happen but we seem to be in unprecedented times.

I hope these crazy times in Europe will come to an end peacefully and quietly and with much lower prices for energy fo our friends in Euope.

 Can you really live on 350.00 to 500.00 USD a month in the Philippines, Mexico or Guatemala in 2022? And why would you want too?

I still get this question a lot and so want to write on if this is possible and why you may want to live on a small budget like that if you are from the western world.

Usually if you search online for information like this and you find a forum to ask a question on this you will be met with derision scorned laughed at and made fun of, so most people don't really talk about it much.

With the rise in inflation in 2022 I would say the days of living on 300 to 350 USD a month are over in the developing world but if you are creative you can find a way. One way that's easy is to just do house sitting gigs and go house to house. Another is to volunteer and get room and board included in exchange for 4 to 6 hours work a day. In this article I wont be explaining those opportunities. 

Why would you want to live that frugally?

Well maybe that's all you have to live on although now days most pensions are above that. Another reason is you are in the process of building up a business and you enjoy living in Mexico or the Philippine's or even Guatemala.

If you have an online business but no saving for emergencies or doing fun stuff you may want to live your first few years on a tight budget of 400 to 500 USD a month and save your earnings to fund a retirement account and or an emergency budget and prefer not to do that in a western country and want out now.

Ideally before you leave the Untied States you should have more than 5k to 10k saving just to have a longer burn rate or if you don't have that already have an income of 300 to 500 USD a month from your online work.

If you choose to live in Mexico and wish to live on 300 to 500 USD then you will have to go local and live like a local. To do that you will need the help of a local to help you find cheap rent in a safe place. To do that you will need to live in a small community and not a big city. One example of that is Calderitas beach, which is by Chetumal, Mexico.

Their you will be near the beach and there are many cheap houses to rent for 50 USD and up. Of course these wont be luxury houses or even super middle class, but you will have a few rooms and a kitchen and internet connections and everything else you will need to work online and function. Its such a small community where everyone knows everyone that crime is little unless you piss someone off.

In communities like this it will be best to be introduced into the community by someone who lives their and has a good reputation, it is why you will need help from a local to introduce you around and help you find a place to rent. Your biggest expense will be rent and food and wifi but I have come across gringos who are doing it for under 400 USD a month but of course they are young and building up a business and aren't really to old to enjoy a lifestyle like that.

Another gringo does essentially the same thing in Puebla, Mexico and his rent is something like 600 USD a month, hes on a pension and am not sure why its that low but does just fine on that budget. Of course youll not be living high off the hog but will have high speed internet and sometimes a pretty big house compared to the studio I have in Guatemala. 

I live in Guatemala in the second biggest city in Guatemala and have a studio for 250USD and with my food and booze budget never spend more than 600 USD a month but have other income sources from online business and dividend shares that help build up my savings.

When I lived in the Philippines my rent was 80 USD a month and at that time I had a partner so spent more than the 300 to 500 USD per month budget but even then I didn't spend more than 600 a month. Food and beer their is cheap eating out in local places wasn't much either and its cheaper than Mexico or Guatemala as far as eating out.

The hardest part of finding cheap places to rent?

The hardest part to getting cheap rents is not speaking the language and getting gringo prices. That is why you will need someone trust worthy to help you find cheap places and normally that will be your girlfriend or partner who lives in that area and understands cultural norms their and can help you negotiate a cheap rent. 

If you cant do that it will take time building up trust with locals who will then help you find a place and it all takes time and is or can be frustrating when you as a gringo are in a hurry to find a place.

Right now in 2022 there are foreigners in the Philippines rent houses or small apartments for under a 100 bucks a month and if you watch them you can see how tough it is to live on 350 USD a month and will really have to love being their to enjoy it but it can be done and more money is better and as things wind down in the western world you better leave now and find yourself a cheap place to hunker down in.

So if you want to have a lower cost of living and a second chance of finding romance head out as soon as you can.

Good Luck!

How to survive and prosper during the Great Reset.

 How to survive and prosper during the Great Reset.

If you want to survive and prosper during the Great Reset and live in North America then I would say you need to move to a small city or small rural town in Texas or Florida or at least somewhere without a State income tax, Alaska might be best for that but its to cold for me and Texas is right next to Mexico and easy to bug out too.

Buying a house in rural America can be much cheaper than on the cities on the east coast or west coast. If we go into a recession they may get cheaper.

The benefits of living in rural America in a State without income tax is of course lower tax, being left alone, being with like minded people ect.

If you want to live off grid and be less dependent on the State I would start learning to garden and or raise animals for food and in general stock up on foodstuffs before they become unaffordable or just unavailable do to supply chain issues.

I would want to live one or two hours from a big city in case I need to fly somewhere to do business or need to be close to medical facilities.

Its the perfect solution if you want to stay in North America and avoid big city problems like crime, homelessness and rising taxes or the loss of freedom in bigger cities.

I would probably own some gold and silver coins and all the tools I would think I would need if infrastructure ever breaks down. 

For me I would keep some wealth offshore even if I was not planning on leaving just incase of asset forfeiture or I had to leave quickly and quietly for some legal reason and my assets were frozen or just gone. It can be a pain in the neck to travel with silver and gold coins and tough to sell them for their value in a foreign country and that's what I will do or do now, I don't care much to live in the United States and watch things go into the toilet.

If I was fed up and could not take the loss of liberty I would plan now on getting a second residency in Latin America and already have my passport and bank accounts like Charles Schwab already set up, Charles Schwab has ATM fees refunded to you every month.

I like Latin America because of the ease it takes to get a residency almost anywhere, the low cost of living and privacy when banking if you set up an S.A. company properly.

I also like it because in the Americas you are in the land of the immigrants so its easy to fit in if you are single and want to marry and have kids.

If you can work online and get a legal residency in Paraguay, its one of the easiest but by no means necessarily the best but for people with German heritage its nice but hot. You will need 5k for the lawyer to set up and a 5k deposit which you get back after the process is over which can take 3 to 6 months. Its also nice because you only need to spend one day every three years to keep it up and legal.

Its agricultural and fairly traditional and very low taxed, if your incomes from overseas you don't need to pay tax their, but may have a tax obligation in your home country. 

In the cities its fairly safe quiet and boring so it may not be for everyone. Its a major tax haven in the area so a good base for business and has great food to eat great for people who are health contentious.

Its location in South America means its in the middle of nowhere and not easy to get to and may be a deterrent for criminal delinquent's if SHTF.

Their are many places to live in Latin America if Paraguay isn't your cup of tea. My favorites are Mexico, Guatemala, and in Asia Philippines.

In many places its not really hard to get a retiree visa or student visa and business visa so many options or just be a P.T. and live in three or four countries on tourist visas.

My choice for surviving and prospering during the Great Reset is to live and work and play and bank overseas. The regulatory hassle and tax hassle and cost of living is now unbearable for many now in North America so I choose to leave for the time being.

How much does it cost to live in (Xela) Quetzaltenango Guatemala 06/09/22 (cost of living 2022)

 How much does it cost to live in (Xela) Quetzaltenango Guatemala 06/09/22 (cost of living 2022)

In the United States and Europe right now the cost of living is through the roof and rising. I think in most of the developed world inflation is running 9 to 12% right now. I an writting this in September 6, 2022. 

I think the average rent in the United States is something like 1200 USD or more. I can say in Phoenix Arizona rents are going up 20% last year and 10% this year with low end rents at 1200 to 1500 USD a month. 

The cost of groceries are very expensive now days, and going out to eat unaffordable. I would like to say the average cheap place to eat in the States is 15 bucks and up and tips are at 20% or more.

Its not surprising people are homeless and or living in cars and vans with the cost of living so high and now we are seeing an exodus of North American's leaving for Latin America. 

I live in Guatemala Xela to be exact and even here you see North Americans flooding in including Mennonites. 

This is my attempt to give the reader an idea what the cost of living is for a single person who want to live on a budget.

The cost of living in Guatemala has been going up just like everywhere else in the world. Just yesterday I bought a canister of cooking gas (propane) for 16 bucks, it used to be 14 bucks but I am not complaining, it will last me 2 to 3 months before I need to refill it.

My rent for a studio all utilities included is more or less 250 USD a month. You can rent a room cheaper if you want or get something for 200 USD but the utilities may not be included. The water lights and wifi are included in those costs, if separate wifi can be up to 50 bucks for really fast wifi 25 or less for a little slower.

I have seen electric bills at 10 to 15 at other places I rented but I am single so for more people it would be more.

I don't really eat out a lot but a low end place can be 3 to 5 bucks and the nicer places for steak ect will be 15 to 20 bucks a plate including beer.

Just some random food prices.

Eggs 30 for 4.60 to 5.80 Brown eggs or the white one.

Beef 4.20 a # again all prices USD

Veggies you can get bags of veggies in a bag in the market .70 cents a bag. 

Sausage (Chorizo, Longaniza ect) 5.80 a # That's in stores cheaper in the market.

  A liter of wine from Spain 2.70

Rice dried beans .60 cents a #

Oatmeal 1 dollar a #

Local beer .60 cents and up for a pint, 2.70 a pint for artesian beer.

As you can see I don't spend much here. I budget 800 USD a month and spend about 500 to 600 USD if I don't travel on the weekends.

If you want to rent a house in the nice part of town plan on spending 450 USD and up, it will be 5 bedrooms and a few bathrooms.

I don't have a car but they are at about USD prices or less but be careful driving here and get insurance you will need it.

There you have it, it can still be cheaper living here and a slower lifestyle here.

With all the foreigners moving here and Mexico the cost of living in Guatemala is going up but still affordable for foreigners compared to North America or Europe.

If you can work online you can live here and save money for your retirement and have a great life.

What to do if your about to become homeless.

 

Here is an article about elderly people who are about to become homeless. Go here for for full article.  On the East Coast of the United States an older retired lady will lose her apartment to a new owner who will remodel the apartment and raise the rent higher than she can afford. Her rent now is 850 dollars a month. 

The current owner sold to a new owner and the new owner will remodel and according to the news article raise the rent double or triple her current rent. She is being kicked out and has no where to go as the rents in her area are out of her budget.

This is a sad situation that is more common to read about everyday in America. More and more people are being made homeless because of sky rocketing rents across North America.

She is being given a short time to leave and it may not really be enough for her to readjust to moving in her home town much less across the country or a new country in which she can afford. Also she id older and doesn't have much saving to pack and move her stuff and have money for first and last months rent.

If I were in her situation I would not pay the last few months rent before getting kicked out and use the money to start a new life somewhere cheaper, like Mexico. Most of North America has pretty high rents that many people cant really afford and as Mexico is nearby and easy to get a tourist visa or resident visa that's where I would plan to go. 

I would start by getting over the emotional issue of moving my stuff from one country to another or one state to another, so I would sell off all my stuff and put the cash in the bank that's attached to an ATM card and use the saved money for my new life in Mexico. Most people cant make that emotional adjustment so if you can you get the advantage.

Next I would go online and set up an appointment with this lady. She has a service where you can pay her as little as 15 dollars for 15 minutes and she will give you the lowdown on hot to rent a one bedroom or two for 250 USD and up or a studio for 175.00 to 200 USD per month. She can also suggest professionals you can hire to get a residency visa and real estate professionals if you want to buy or rent and advise on who to buy fixer uppers for 25K to 35K. 

She can save you so much time and money you can basically move into her part of Mexico on the beach, Huatulco for less than 2500 all in even cheaper. She can introduce you to all the other retired expats and help you readjust to your new lifestyle their. It would be my answer to being homeless in North America. Of course if you don't like the beach there are colonial towns up in the mountains that are just as cheap.

If you don't like Mexico there are other countries to, or you can just move to a low cost place in the States but even small towns rents are high.

After I got settled in I would look to supplement my income by starting a side business or working online to increase my saving and that will increase your options for the future. 

Bugging out before your homeless and looking for low cost of living arrangements are what I would do as the alternative to being homeless in North America.

How to prepare for being homeless.

 How to prepare and plan for being homeless.

This post is about how to make plans if your about to be homeless and how to deal with it if you think it will happen. 

If your about to become homeless they first thing to do is plan for it even though you will think it will not happen. The more you plan for it the less likely it will happen at least that's what I think. 

The first think to to make sure you have a bank account even two if its possible with at least some money in it. The second thing to consider is to make sure it is set up with a PayPal account. The reason for this is because you can get paid and or pay other people with the account. Most government assistance requires a bank account nowadays, the days of getting a check are less and less. Its even the same with day labour type temp jobs. So make sure you have at least one or two bank accounts with ATM cards set up so you can get money either through family friends or a job you do or any online you may do at the library.

I would also buy a secret pocket you can sew into your pants something like this or this. You will need a secret place to hide cash, all links are affiliates.

The next thing is a backpack. I suggest a small one and don't put to much stuff in it. Have something that can accommodate a small laptop or tablet, you will need these for your online accounts to send and receive money and to get your benefits.

I suggest only one change of clothes and toiletries. You will want to travel light. I am in the desert area (Phoenix) Some will suggest a tent, I don't but if you have the sash a bivy sack or sleeping bag. Something cheap will work but the more expensive ones are light weight and work better and can help you keep a low profile from people who might do you harm.

You will need a all purpose tool and small cooking stove and the gas canisters that go with it. Small gas canisters go for 2 for 6.00 bucks or less at Walmart. You will need a small cooking container to cook stuff and I suggest you keep it small lightweight and low profile. I prefer to cook and sleep in the desert than say a shelter but you may need to go their from time to time to get food.  

A good recourse for help is your local library. You can use to to get free online internet, free recourses for any benefits you may qualify for and help in general. You can use the bathrooms get water ask the librarian for help in ideas on what government programs you can apply for to get any kind of aid that's available. 

The biggest thing you will need to survive homelessness is mindset.  You will need a positive mindset to survive the depression your about to encounter. You will need a positive mindset to find safe places to sleep and to avoid predator's out their who will harm you.

If your a woman you can get shelter in a homeless shelter. Many shelter's are open to only women. Many churches provide shelter for showers and or food so look up those places, you can find that data from your local librarian or by going online and searching for it.

I would avoid homeless encampments. There are many criminals and police who will harass  you and steal and hurt from you, avoid those areas.

I would sell off whatever I had for cash before I became homeless you will need all the cash you can get, also try to get set up at a blood bank before your homeless to sell your blood platelets, you can earn enough from that to provide for all your food needs without working directly.

If you can have a website or social media set up before you become homeless. I hate to say it but you need to lose all shame and advertise your situation and ask for help, its easy for people to send you donations with PayPal. I even see people with YouTube channels making videos about their homeless lifestyles and getting either add revenue or donations or both, you can get it paid right into your bank account. So have those options set up before the poop hits the fan.

The first night will be the hardest. Try to find a place where you can hide and not be disturbed. Try to find a place where you can cook or heat up a can of food from the dollar store. Make sure you have water to stay hydrated and a cup to pour water into to take a sponge bath and have baby wipes to keep clean and rubbings alcohol to keep clean to. Keeping clean and clean shaven will increase the odds of getting day labour type jobs for either cash or paid through the ATM at day labour type places in big cities.

During your day you will need to keep busy by either working online or asking for work or you will go crazy. 

There are so many things I'm forgetting but these are the basics to help you prepare for homelessness. 

The most important things are having an idea where you will camp before this happens, having cash in a safe area and in your bank account tied to an ATM card and PayPal. The other thing is to get some kind of monthly income through government assistance or some online gig even if its only a few hundred bucks. There are so many ways to make fifty to a hundred bucks nowadays online the world is your oyster. 

One more thing, make sure to have multiple IDs hidden away, for example a drivers license and or passport card so you have ID to get on a bus or airplane or even passport to avoid harassments from police and or to dip down to Mexico for a lower cost of living once you get you income up to a decent level like 500 to 1k.

Its tough to exist in America without ID but at least in Mexico you don't really need it much.

I mention Mexico because I see so many people down their homeless who are North Americans somehow they survive.

Good Luck

 Decentralization is here and changing the world fast.

The world is changing fast than I can adjust to the new technology that's coming online on a daily basis.

Bitcoin and new Etherium and other social tokens are changing how we live work and play. Now we can live anywhere we want in the world and trade do business and don't even need banks like we used to. Now I can buy sell or trade BTC or ETH or stable coins like USDC and pay all my bills and expenses in most parts of the world.

For example, I just read about an APP you can use in Brazil to order almost any grocery item and have it delivered to your home and all can be paid for via cryptocurrency. The difference between this APP and others is this company has a warehouse-like Amazon and the guy who delivers doesn't have to do the actual shopping like other APPS.  This company is also starting the same business in Mexico so now there are more companies like Amazon to compete and bring us products and services cheaper.

Another example of how the world is decentralizing is now we can put most or all of our assets online, via banking or brokering on our laptop. I can pay all my bills electronically all without having to mail a letter and in my case all free. So now we are not stuck going to a bank to pay for stuff or living in one location we don't like. We can now put all our books on an APP like Amazon Kindle and take it with us anywhere we want to go. We can buy BTC or Bitcoin and put it in our online wallet and leave to live anywhere in the world where we see opportunity and don't have to live in places where there is no opportunity or where taxes are high or the cost of living is high or burdensome regulations stop us from creating wealth.

We can now start an online business and liver where rents are cheap like in a small town or foreign country where our food and rent costs are low and the weather is nice and maybe better places for dating mating and making new friends.

We are not stuck in small towns or big cities where we don't like living. We are now seeing migration from the third world to the first and the first world to the third world. People are going to wherever they see an opportunity for a better life.

Of course, this will be a great disruption and many people may not be able to adjust to this new world.  I think in the next ten years our world will be a much better place than now.

Can you still rent a studio at the beach in Mexico 2021 for 200 to 300 a month?

 

Can you still rent a studio at the beach in Mexico 2021 for 200 to 300 a month?

While I was doing research on a place to live for the next few months I came across this yound lady and her husbands YouTube website, called Retire in Mexico

While I was looking at her channel I saw quite a few videos on studio apartments for 200 to 300USD a month in Huatulco, Mexico. Huatulco is in the state of Oaxaca, Mexico. Its a beach town near Puerto Escondido and Zipolite, These are all beach towns that are relatively cheaper than say the Cancun area in Mexico.

Its going to be hot and sweaty most of the year but not all of the year, but it can still be affordable even though your in a beach area. The biggest problem as I see it is the lack of fast internet, so if you need really fast internet it might not be for you or if you don't like hot weather it might not be for you.

If you like more colder weather you can always head to Oaxaca and you will be higher in the mountains or just head to Chiapas, San Cristobal De Las Casas is nice and cheap especially as you get out of the tourist area. 

Anyway as I was looking at this young ladies YouTube site she has many videos on house or small apartments studios for 200 to 300 USD per month and place you can buy for 25,000 to 35,000 USD if you want.

Here is an example of some cheap place you can rent for three months and see if you like the area.

Here is the link

There are many of videos on her channel on cheap places to live how to get the visa to live their ect..

I suggest going to her channel and reaching out to her through her link where you pay 15 bucks for 15 minutes and you can see if she can help you ease the transition from the United States or Canada or Europe. If you can build up trust with a person on the ground who knows all the places to rent and all the professionals for healthcare legal services ect it can save you a fortune in money and time. Her service is cheap at 60 bucks an hour and I would use it.

So if your looking to live on the beach in Huatulco, Oaxaca, Mexico check out her channel and see if its for you. You can still live a happy and prosperous affordable like on or near the beach in Mexico 2021. So if you want to leave the madness of North America and looking for a safe place to hang out and meet other expats check her channel out and Mexico in general.

How to survive when your broke, tips and tricks.

 

Recently in in this new recession corona virus times most or many people lost their jobs and had to make adjustments. One of the adjustments was they have to get used to a higher cost of living in the United States or many parts in Western Europe.

One of those costs is higher rents and higher food prices. 

This article is meant for people to have a strategy before a crisis happens or they are made homeless or something like that.

Have a plan B. 

In my case I always like to live in the cheaper parts of the world so, if I have to live on my saving for awhile I can live cheap, find work online or offline and still afford to pay my rent and buy groceries and live a decent life.

One example of this was when I lived in the United States in Iowa and my rent was 175.00USD in one of the Northern Iowa regions, now that rent would be closer to 250.00 USD. It was a big apartment and not really a hardship to live in and it was a really small town and a mellow place to live and I got a job as a welder in one of the near small towns.

It was a cool place to live although not much to do. I mad 13.00 bucks an hour, which although not much was enough to pay my rent save some money and plan some travels overseas.

In my case I have a list of places I can go to to live cheap either in the United States or south of the border in Mexico or Guatemala. I have rented small studios for anywhere from 150.00USD to 300USD although for 300USD you can rent a small house with a place to park your car, at least in Guatemala you can and even in some places in Mexico.

So I am always willing to move and rent a small studio, and if I am really broke am willing to just rent a room in a house from 50USd to say 100USD, I even rented a room in Lima, Peru for 90USD a month but that was 2 years ago.

I always have some emergency saving in gold and silver coins and nowadays I would include Bitcoin in that mix. The reason I do is at least in my case I normally wont sell a gold coin unless I am really hard up for cash so that always leaves me with at least some resources at my disposal, its the same with Bitcoin.

Gold is very marketable almost in any part of the world so, if for example I am in Mexico and I need cash I just go to the coin stores and sell some gold or I go to the jewelry stores hint, if you have a hard time getting a good price on your gold just go to a jewelry store and many times you will get the current gold price.

Its the same with Bitcoin, in fact its easy to sell Bitcoin and have the money deposited to your account or your lawyers account then you can just send it to your ATM account and withdraw anywhere in the world you find yourself.

So say you have 10K USD in your ATM account you can at least last a year before running out of money, you could live in Asia or Latin America on 800USD a month and have a year to work on building up your business or working at an online job.

Speaking of working online. You should always have at least 2 online accounts set up before you need them. Assuming your in the USA have at least one account at a large bank that has low fees to withdraw your money overseas like Charles Shaub bank. Then have another account set up to send money back and forth to Charles Shaub account to get the ATM fees reimbursed to your account.

I would have both accounts set up with PayPal so you can send and receive money from clients and pay all your bills online. I would have 2 or more accounts that can send and receive money from clients and all your banks in case one account gets flagged and then you can at least move the money to the other account and use the ATM card from the other account so you are not without money when your overseas.

I would at least have one or two credit cards just in case you get into a jam and need emergency money to get home or have to pay some unforeseen expense and not end up homeless on the street some where in the USA or overseas. Of course it goes without saying never keep a balance on those accounts until you have an actual emergency, just pay the balance off every month if you use them for points or convivence.

The most important thing to consider is to have a plan before the crisis occurs and then work your plan when the crisis occurs. Also have a willingness to be flexible and get out of your comfort zone and do things you have never dome before. Like for example, work online in sales and live overseas to get a lower cost of living and build up your savings.

Thats it for now, if you have any tips leave a comment, thanks.

Best bugout bag for travel.

 

My favorite bug out bags for travel are the back packs from Timbuk2, they are located in San Francisco, California.

Go here for their Website.

The Timbuk2 Tuck and Roll bag is my favorite.

Its the perfect bag for travel mainly because I can pack a lot of stuff into this small bag and easily carry it on the plane as a carry on.

Its also easy to stow under a bus seat or in the rack above the seats. As a budget traveler, I like to pack lite and not carry much, its a great bag to carry just enough to travel. It has room enough for a few pairs of wool shirts, underwear, and socks, and space for my toiletry bag.

The bag itself is light weight and has a top end part of the bag you can roll up or down if you need more space for your stuff. It also has a secret pocket in the bag that you can see from the outside, its a small pocket but nice to have if you want to stash a little cash.

It also has a nice zipper on the outside you can unzip to easily take out your laptop Chromebook, or small laptop.

It has just enough space for all my gadgets so I can live work or play out of this bag.

Go here for a review of this bag.

Bitcoin is changing how we send money overseas.

 Bitcoin is changing how we send money overseas.

Bitcoin is now changing how we send remittance's overseas or even how we send money to loved ones using MoneyGram or even Western Union. In the good ole days we paid 20% of a transaction to send money to our loved ones in the Philippines or Mexico sense then the fees have dropped on half in many cases but are still high compared to using Bitcoin or other Crypto currencies. 

Crypto currency can be sent fast than traditional methods using Swift.

For migrant workers who frequently send money across borders to support their families, the minimal transaction costs of cryptocurrency exchanges beat exorbitant transaction fees of traditional money wire companies like Western Union and MoneyGram, whose dominance of the remittances market has long troubled international development institutions concerned with economic growth. Cryptocurrency transactions are faster than official currency transfers, which require working through banks reliant on SWIFT, the sluggish, half-century-old interbank messaging system that handles cross-border payments.

According to this article there is record use of sending money overseas using Crypto, Go here for chart and article

Crypto currency is also being used to get around U.S Sanctions.

Cryptocurrency exchanges also avoid the political complications of official channels. They have been used to skirt US sanctions to access international payments and financial markets, and by unofficial migrant workers who lack access to local banks. The global reach of cryptocurrencies avoids the inflation risk inherent to official currencies, especially in politically unstable countries reliant on fickle foreign investors.

So far Latin America is the regions most affected by use of Crypto currency and time will tell if this trend continues.

The good news is Crypto currency and Bitcoin is forcing the legacy money transfer companies to lower their fees and to compete. The banks so far have resisted lowering their fees, in time they may need to lower their fees to compete or lobby the Governments of the world to regulate or shut down their competitors. Time will tell how it all works out for holders and users of Bitcoin and Crypto currency.

Go here for full article.

Margin debt is at all time highs, signaling a market collapse.

Margin debt is money investors borrow using there stocks as collateral. Margin debt is at an all time high.

The rise and fall of margin debt parallels the rise and fall of the stock market. Most of the time margin debt peaks right before a stock market falls or collapse. Then when Margin debt is at an all time low the stock market starts recovering and begins a long rebound.

Here is a chart from Wolf Richter.

Go here for his full article

Richter says we are in a stock market mania.

Margin debt – the amount that individuals and institutions borrow against their stock holdings as tracked by FINRA at its member brokerage firms – is just one indication of stock market leverage. But FINRA reports it monthly. Other types of stock market leverage are not reported at all, or are disclosed only piecemeal in SEC filings by brokers and banks that lend to their clients against their portfolios, such as Securities-Based Loans (SBLs). No one knows how much total stock market leverage there is. But margin debt shows the trend.

In February, margin debt jumped by another $15 billion to $813 billion, according to FINRA. Over the past four months, margin debt has soared by $154 billion, a historic surge to historic highs. Compared to February last year, margin debt has skyrocketed by $269 billion, or by nearly 50%

He says margin debt is high, for example Fidelity charges 8.325% on balances of less than 25,000USD. Morgan Stanley charges 7.75% for balances below 100,000. If you have 50 million or more Morgan Stanley charges 3.375.

Leverage usually blows ups accounts and the dream of riches that went with it. The reason account blow up is because most of the time stock markets eventually go down and at the first sign of trouble brokers raise rates and margin requirements to hold those kinds of accounts and most investors cant meet the new requirements.

Here Mr. Richter says.

Leverage is the great accelerator of stock prices, on the way up, and on the way down. Purchasing stocks with borrowed money creates buying pressure, and prices rise, and rising prices increase the margin balances a portfolio can support, and this encourages more stock-buying on margin.

On the other hand, selling stocks to deal with margin calls adds more selling pressure to an already declining market. The more prices fall, the more selling pressure there is from frazzled forced sellers trying to deal with margin requirements.

And then he says.

The historic surge in margin balances in recent months is another indicator of how hyper-speculative and blindly courageous the mega-bubble has become. All kinds of new theories are being proffered why fundamentals and valuations are meaningless, and why prices of all assets will shoot to the moon, no matter what.

I think its not different this time and we will see a big selloff soon, maybe this Fall or sooner buckle up its going to be a wild ride.

John Hussman, says markets are in the greatest bubble in history and could crash at any moment, and crash more than people think.

 John Hussman is one of the smartest stock market analyst out there who actually manages money.

He is an impressive writer and investor and that is rare in these modern times.

In his latest report he says stock markets are overvalued and could crash fast and at anytime and he is ready to sell at any moment.

Go here to read the report.

If you can print it out and read it many times to get the gist of how bad it could really get.

He talks about exponential curves. He explains how they work and why they are bad now.

The stock markets have gone up so much and more money has piled into the markets including pension funds and reinvestments that the slightest selling could really crash the stock markets.

To keep markets from crashing the Fed may have to step in to rescue the stock markets from crashing again like in 2019. At some point the Fed will not be able to control the crash and will have to throw in the towel and let markets fall ruining the retirement dreams of millions, the political ramifications from that will be astounding.

Here he describes a bubble{

The defining feature of a bubble is inconsistency between expected returns based on price behavior and expected returns based on valuations. If investors pay $150 today for a security that will deliver a single $100 payment a decade from now, but they also fully understand that they’ll lose 4% annually on the deal, without extrapolating past gains into the future, then we might say the security is overvalued, and we might question why investors would accept that trade, but we can’t call it a bubble.

But if investors pay $150 today for that security, because they look back in the rear-view mirror, decide that it “always goes up” over time, and convince themselves that expected future returns are always positive, then you’ve got a bubble. Discounting the future $100 cash flow of the security using any positive expected return would produce a price less than $100. So the positive returns expected by investors are inconsistent with the returns that would equate price with discounted cash flows. The size of the bubble is the fraction of the market price that represents expectational “hot air.”

Likewise, the willingness of investors to embrace “passive investments” like ETFs and asset-backed securities based on past performance, with little concern about the valuations, yields, or credit risk of the securities inside, is a the very soap from which bubbles repeatedly emerge. Amid the current enthusiasm for special purpose acquisition companies (SPACS), investors might recall the bubble in “incubators” at the 2000 peak, the “conglomerates” of the late-1960’s Go-Go bubble, and even the South Sea Company in the early 1700’s, along with similar companies formed at the time “for carrying on an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is.”

If investors price the S&P 500 at levels that are highly likely to produce negative returns for a decade, as they did in 1929 and 2000, and as I believe they are doing at present, yet investors continue to press stock prices higher on the expectation that they will provide historically normal levels of future return regardless of valuations, then you have the sort of inconsistency that defines a bubble.

Likewise, if the expected return of a conventional passive investment mix is negative on a 10-12 year horizon (based on reliable valuation measures strongly correlated with actual subsequent returns over a century of market history), yet pension return assumptions remain locked near 7% annually, you’ve got a bubble, and most likely a future pension funding crisis, on your hands.

He thinks the next ten years we will see negative rate of returns, he makes a good case on why this will happen and is inevitable.

Check out this cool chart, its scary

Again he says we are in a bubble.

Margin debt, people who borrow money to buy stocks.

What the losses will be.

Sticking with 4% nominal growth, and adding a 1.5% dividend yield, a “permanently high plateau” in market valuations would imply S&P 500 total returns of about 5.5% annually. Again, this assumes that valuations never retreat from levels that presently stand at about 3.6 times their historical norms. Simply allow them to retreat to 2.4 times their historical norms a decade from now – which would still keep valuations among the highest 10% in U.S. history – and the resulting 10-year total return would drop to about 1.3%. I think this would actually be the best-case scenario even in a permanently overvalued world.

At elevated valuations, even very small changes in expected return imply enormous changes in prices. So it’s unlikely that a period of much higher average valuations will escape the prospect of relatively high volatility. Rather than a 70% market decline, which would presently be required for the S&P 500 to simply touch historically run-of-the-mill valuation norms, investors could expect rather frequent market losses in the 20-35% range, which is essentially what we’ve seen even over the past few years.

All of that would be fine with us. We’ve adapted our discipline sufficiently (especially in late-2017) to tolerate the possibility of permanently sustained overvaluation. My impression is that the impact of those adaptations has become more evident as we’ve had greater opportunities to live into them. I can’t say that I believe for a second that investors will actually be spared from a 50-70% loss in the S&P 500 in the coming years, but again, it will be fine with us if the market never approaches historical valuation norms again. With the adaptations we introduced in late-2017, our discipline is flexible enough to navigate a bubble even without embracing its premise.

People may lose 70% of there pension's in this upcoming stock market crash.

President Biden and Fed chair Powell aren't prepared for this. It will get ugly, hopefully your cashed up and own a little gold.