The Daily Headlines! December 16, 2025

Gold’s Rally to $5,000 in 2026 Will Outperform U.S. Dollar and Bonds
Gold will continue to outperform U.S. bonds and the greenback through 2026, which is why one major bank is maintaining its maximum allocation and recommends that investors buy the precious metal on dips.

“Gold, Mr. Bond.”

Ahead of the new year, market analysts at Société Générale said they are maintaining a 10% allocation to gold in their multi-asset portfolio. The French bank is holding its gold allocation steady as it reduces its exposure to U.S. inflation-linked bonds to zero and cuts its corporate bond holdings by half, to 5%.

“In a year when fixed income has struggled and USD weakness has weighed on the common-currency return of USD assets, SGMAP has performed well with balanced allocation. Our theme of broadening in asset price performance is reflected in the performance of various equity markets and other assets like gold,” the analysts said in their latest report. “Going forward, we expect this broadening theme to persist amid falling interest rates in the US.”

The analysts reiterated their call for gold prices to hit $5,000 an ounce by the end of next year… (Continue to full article)

Six Figures Is Survival” – Even High Earners Are Drowning Financially As The U.S. Dollar Is Transformed Into Toilet Paper
Inflation is a tax that nobody can escape. No matter how hard you may try, the rising cost of living is going to catch up with you eventually, and we live at a time when the cost of living has become exceedingly painful.

The reason why the cost of living has become such an important issue is because those that are running the system have been treating our currency like toilet paper. Many of us warned what would happen when the Federal Reserve started printing money out of thin air and monetizing the debt. But instead of learning their lesson, they are beginning to do it again.

And Congress is spending so much money that the monthly budget deficit for the month of October just set an all-time record.

What they are doing to us is literally insane, and the middle class is dying right in front of our eyes… (Continue to full article)

Mining Waste in the US Contains Billions of Dollars of Precious Metals
Across the United States, piles of gray rock sit beside giant open pits. These leftovers from mining look useless, yet they are loaded with metals that modern technology depends on.

A new study finds that just one year of U.S. mine waste holds enough lithium to power about 10 million electric cars, along with large amounts of other scarce metals, according to a recent analysis.

The research focuses on 54 active metal mines and shows that if companies recovered even a small share of the extra elements they already dig up, U.S. dependence on imported supplies could shrink sharply… (Continue to full article)

An Ounce Of Silver Is Now Worth More Than A Barrel Of Oil — First Time In 45 Years
Silver has finally crossed a threshold untouched since 1980. Today, the white metal trades above $60 per ounce, while oil sits below $60 per barrel.

In essence, that means one ounce of silver can now buy more than a single barrel of oil, a dynamic unseen since January 1980, if excluding the technical distortion during April 2020 when WTI futures briefly went negative.

The reversal is striking on its own, but it also signals a tectonic shift in the hierarchy of global commodity markets.

Year-to-date, silver – as tracked by the iShares Silver Trust – has rallied 110%, while oil has tumbled 22%…. (Continue to full article)

Americans Barely Own Gold — and That Means Prices Could Climb Even Further
Gold’s record rally this year has grabbed headlines, but American investors barely own any of it, which means the yellow metal’s price could have more room to run, according to Goldman Sachs.

Even with gold hitting repeated highs, US ownership hasn’t budged much. Gold ETF exposure is still six basis points, or 0.06 percentage points, below its 2012 peak since the launch of gold ETFs in the mid-2000s, according to Goldman’s analysis published on Wednesday.

The low gold allocation is simply because “portfolio growth has outpaced gains in gold prices and volumes over the past decade,” Goldman’s analysts wrote.

And while gold has surged to new all-time highs in 2025, Goldman’s analysis shows that the rally hasn’t translated into meaningful increases in actual US ownership…. (Continue to full article)

Shockingly High Numbers Of Americans Are Skipping Meals Or Putting Off Medical Care Because Of The High Cost Of Living

Do you remember all of those people over the years that warned us that the cost of living would eventually spiral out of control?

The Century Foundation just conducted a survey that came up with some absolutely stunning results…

* 29% of registered voters said they delayed or skipped medical care over the past year; including 49% of voters under 30 years old, 37% of Hispanic voters and 32% of Black voters.

* 24% said they delayed or skipped buying medicine prescribed by their doctor.

* 64% of poll respondents said they switched to cheaper groceries or cut back on groceries; including 79% of voters under 30 years old, 74% of Black voters, 72% of women, and 71% of Hispanic voters.

* 34% of registered voters said they’ve skipped a meal to save money, including 54% of voters younger than 30 years old, 44% of Black voters, 41% of Hispanic voters, and 39% of women.

* 48% of poll respondents said they tapped into savings to meet daily expenses, including 59% of voters younger than 30 years old, 57% of Hispanic voters, 55% of Black voters and 52% of women.

These numbers are crazy. Large segments of the U.S. population are now going without the essentials because the cost of living has become so oppressive… (Continue to full article)

Do You Agree That It Takes A Minimum Of $136,500 A Year For A Family Of Four To Afford The Basics In America Today?
If your household is struggling to pay the bills right now, you are far from alone. The cost of just about everything that Americans regularly spend money on has been soaring, and as a result our standard of living has been steadily declining.

Over the past couple of decades, our politicians borrowed and spent trillions of dollars that we did not have, the Federal Reserve shoveled giant mountains of money that were created out of thin air into the financial system, and our leaders treated the reserve currency of the world like toilet paper. So now the value of the U.S. dollar has gone way down, our paychecks don’t stretch as far as they once did, and most of the country is barely scraping by from month to month.

This week, an excellent article that was authored by Michael Green is getting a ton of attention. In that article, he calculates that a “basic needs budget” for a typical family of four in the United States would come to a grand total of $136,500 a year…

Needless to say, most Americans don’t have a prayer of making 5 million dollars during their lifetimes. And the cost of just about everything is only going to go even higher…. (Continue to full article)

With the Penny Going Away, What Should You Do With the Ones in Your Coin Jar?
By now, most Americans know the U.S. Mint won’t be making any more pennies. Some businesses began reporting shortages of the coins even before the last pennies were stamped.

President Donald Trump ordered the Treasury to stop minting pennies because their production cost exceeds their value. (Intriguingly, the same is true of nickels.)

Many Americans regard both nickels and pennies as more nuisance than currency. The typical household is sitting on $60 to $90 in neglected coins, enough to fill one or two pint-size beer mugs, according to the Federal Reserve. Americans throw away millions of dollars in coins every year, literally treating them like trash.

Some of your pennies – MIGHT be worth some MONEE… (Continue to full article)

Silver Hits $60 For The First Time
Here’s Why Prices Are Outpacing Gold…

Silver prices rose to a record high Tuesday, surpassing the $60 milestone for the first time as the precious metal has outpaced gold this year amid a global supply squeeze and another expected interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve.

The latest surge in silver prices comes as traders are pricing in 87% odds of the Federal Reserve lowering interest rates by a quarter-point Wednesday, according to CME’s FedWatch tool, which would cut rates to between 3.5% and 3.75%—an uptick in precious metal prices often coincides with reduced interest rates and a weaker U.S. dollar…. (Continue to full article)

Gold Climbs as Fed Cut Bets Build Before Inflation Data
Gold is grinding higher as traders increasingly price in interest rate cuts from the Federal Reserve and brace for the next major inflation reading.

On the screen, the move in gold is visible in both intraday charts and longer term trend lines that show the metal grinding toward record territory. Live pricing from bullion dealers highlights how the Gold Spot Price has been fluctuating around the $4,200 mark, with the table of Gold Spot Prices, Gold Price and Change underscoring how even small percentage moves now translate into large dollar swings.

For investors who bought into the rally earlier in the year, that volatility is a feature rather than a bug, since it reflects deep liquidity and intense positioning…. (Continue to full article)

Silver Breaks Past $60 An Ounce For The First Time

How high the Moon?

The current historic streak began on November 28, when spot silver climbed past $55 an ounce for the first time, buoyed by a weak dollar as traders bet on a potential interest rate cut on Dec. 10. The rally continued on Monday with silver climbing above $58 per ounce and extended on Wednesday, with the XAG/USD pair hitting a high of $58.95 an ounce. Last Friday, silver breached $59 for the first time.

Today, silver is again moving sharply higher. This time, however, it appears that the price appreciation of this precious metal has some fundamental weight behind it – and on Thursday – silver hit $64.30 per ounce… (Continue to full article)

Why Beef Prices Are Out of Control in the U.S.

Andrew Yang warns of a “catastrophic” hit to 40M workers

But the Fiat has collapsed anyway…

Andrew Yang is again sounding the alarm on automation, warning that artificial intelligence could erase work for tens of millions of Americans and trigger what he calls a “catastrophic” shock to communities built around vulnerable jobs. His new projection that up to 40 m positions could disappear over the next decade reframes AI not as a distant threat but as a near-term economic upheaval that policymakers have barely begun to confront.

Rather than treating AI as a niche concern for coders and startups, Yang is arguing that the technology is already colliding with the labor market in ways that will reshape entire regions, from logistics hubs to call center corridors. I see his warning as less a prediction of doom than a blunt demand for the country to decide who will bear the costs of this transition: workers, or the companies racing to automate their roles.

Which workers are most exposed to AI displacement… (Continue to full article)

7 Medicare Changes That Could End Your Social Security in 2026

But in reality – It does NOT Care!

Medicare will not literally erase Social Security checks in 2026, but rising premiums and cost-sharing can effectively absorb much of the new benefit for some retirees. With a modest cost-of-living adjustment and multiple program changes hitting at once, the real risk is that higher health costs leave little, if any, of a monthly payment available for everyday expenses.

Medicare premium adjustments that outpace Social Security’s 2.8 percent benefit increase are the first way health costs can quietly consume a retiree’s raise.

Medicare program cuts and premium hikes in 2026 that threaten to evaporate Social Security gains… (Continue to full article)

AARP Issues Blunt Warning: Social Security May Not Deliver Full Benefits Without Major Fixes
For millions of Americans planning for retirement, AARP just issued one of its starkest warnings yet: don’t assume Social Security will fully pay what you’ve been promised. The organization is sounding the alarm as new projections show the program’s trust funds moving closer toward depletion — and sooner than many expected.

A new report highlighted by TheStreet confirms that AARP is urging Americans to brace for potential benefit reductions if Congress does not act quickly. According to AARP’s analysis, the combined Social Security trust funds are projected to run short by 2034, at which point the program will only be able to pay about 81% of scheduled benefits… (Continue to full article)

The Seven Deadly Economic Sins
The seven deadly sins of Christianity are serious “capital” sins because they spawn sinful behavior in general. The seven economic sins of economic policy destroy capital, undermine wage rates, and lower the standard of living. They actually kill people via poverty, malnutrition, suicide, and the like.

Three quarters of Americans think the economy is in bad shape. Optimism for the future is fading fast. Economic problems are getting worse by the day. While pundits do not agree and people are at each other’s throats. The usual solution to each individual problem is more government spending when the government is broke, can’t pay its bills, and is regularly adding trillions to the national debt. It can be overwhelming.

Higher prices or “inflation” is caused by the government’s Federal Reserve printing money. This is really one of the oldest-known teachings of economics dating back 500 years. However, in recent decades the definition of “inflation” has been changed from money printing to increasing prices.

Economic inequality is an expanding problem. The rich are getting richer; the poor are getting poorer… (Continue to full article)

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Let’s do something about that…

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Call Jeffrey Bennett (Kettle Moraine, Ltd.) who has over 35 years experience in the precious metals markets – first as an investor and subsequently – with over 30 years as a respected member of the industry for guidance and assistance with your needs.

Kettle Moraine, Ltd.
P.O. Box 579
Litchfield Park, AZ 85340
602-799-8214

kettlemoraineltd@cox.net

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Brutal Warning for US Workers as Layoffs Surge 24%

America’s jobs market is stuck in neutral.

US employers announced far fewer cuts in November as companies tried to navigate a messy economic backdrop — tariffs, softer demand, and vibes-based uncertainty.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported on Thursday that planned layoffs fell 53 percent from October, dropping to 71,321.

That’s still 24 percent higher than this time last year, and the biggest November total in three years. Continue reading

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Smith ~ America’s Economy and Things to Come

Americans the general sense of where the real American economy lies and the dynamics that suggest no matter how much the Trump administration or any successive administration props it up, an accounting is coming, and it most likely means the inevitable collapse of the U.S. economy. It won’t take much of a hiccup to cause a massive economic disruption to be accompanied by extreme social upheaval and violence, especially given all we have witnessed from our illegal alien “guests” – guests hell – damned foreign takers and looters.

Before this happens, despite Trumps efforts to rid us of taxes and stoke the economy by way of sound energy and immigration policy, we can expect to see Big Government fighting to survive. This means the American people will eventually be put upon with much heavier taxes in order for the nation to remain solvent, as government enforcers take their five pounds of flesh and make Americans bleed money, one way or another. Continue reading

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Where’s the Beef?

Torn between supporting cattle ranchers and bringing down prices, the president is trying to have it both ways on beef.

Think of the cattle auctioneer’s chant as a prayer. To the untrained ear, it’s nonsense, a stream of words compressed beyond recognition. If you know what to listen for, phrases emerge from the hum and buzz: Will you go four? Will you give five? The job of the auctioneer is to whip bidders into a frenzy, selling cows, heifers, bulls, and steers at the highest price possible through the power of constant supplication. Continue reading

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Hickman: Some Thoughts on Silver’s All Time High

The Great City of Uruk

The ancient people of Uruk – who lived in modern-day southern Iraq more than 5,000 years ago – didn’t seem terribly interested in bequeathing colorful stories of their civilization to history.

Rather than memorialize abundant tales of their immense works, or chisel countless tablets embellishing stories of their military victories, the main artifacts they left behind to modern historians are rather mundane market accounts and grain prices.

It would be as if the only thing to be locked into a time capsule from our own era were the stock section of the Wall Street Journal. It would hardly be a reasonable description of our time.

Nevertheless, the ancient scribes of Uruk went to great lengths to record financial and commercial transactions. And one of the things we can see from their civilization is that they used silver (and NOT gold) as the primary medium of exchange. Continue reading

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What Are the Gold Price Predictions for 2026?

Here’s what some experts are expecting.

Gold prices spiked in October, reaching a new record high of over $4,300 per ounce. And while they’ve declined slightly since that point, the yellow metal is still selling at significantly higher prices than just a few years ago.

In fact, as of late November, the gold price per ounce was over $4,100. (Today (11.26.25) – Spot gold is at $4,167.05) In November 2023, it was barely above $2,000. “Gold prices have been experiencing one of the steadiest two-year uptrends ever,” says Jim Wiederhold, commodity indices product manager at Bloomberg Indices/Bloomberg Index Services Limited. Continue reading

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Turner: The “Experts” are telling me “2026 Everything Comes Apart; Nothing Can Stop it

There’s a $38 trillion time bomb ticking in the heart of the American financial system, and in 2026, it’s going to detonate, not with the slow burn of a typical recession, but with the devastating speed of a controlled demolition.

Every domino is already in position, every fuse has been lit, and when the first one falls, the cascade will be unstoppable. Right now, as you’re reading this, over $500 billion in corporate debt is racing toward a refinancing deadline.

Companies that borrowed money at 3% interest rates during the pandemic boom are about to face 9% rates when those loans come due. Banks that seemed rock solid are sitting on portfolios of commercial real estate loans that are worth half what they were two years ago, and the very institutions that were supposed to catch the falling pieces, private credit funds and leveraged loan markets, are quietly pulling back just when the system needs them most. This isn’t another prediction about some distant economic downturn.

This is mathematical certainty. The numbers don’t lie. The timeline is locked in. 

Continue reading

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14 Reasons Silver Isn’t Second Place to Gold When It Comes to Investing

Why are seasoned investors bidding farewell to gold and embracing silver?

Historically, gold has been seen as a more valuable investment than silver, with 24% of Americans saying gold is the strongest investment.

But that doesn’t mean silver isn’t without its benefits. While it can be seen as volatile, particularly over a short period, silver is often considered an inflation-proof option for investors looking to boost their bank accounts.

To get to the facts on silver and whether it’s a wise investment, here are 14 considerations before you add this shiny commodity to your portfolio. Continue reading

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Renewed Interest in Physical Gold Among Investors Amid Economic Uncertainty

Some investors are showing a renewed interest in physical gold. Reports indicate that wealthy individuals and institutions are buying more gold and using secure storage methods. This trend may reflect concerns about future economic conditions. Analysts continue to observe these investment choices and their possible impact on the broader market.

All That Glitters…

[Got physical… close at hand?]

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Kettle Moraine, Ltd.
P.O. Box 579
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1 – 602 – 799 – 8214

KettleMoraineLtd@cox.net

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How Andrew Jackson Freed America From Central Bank Control — and Why It Matters Now

“Jackson Slaying the Many-Headed Monster,” 1828. Private collection, Peter Newark American Pictures / Bridgeman Art Library

It’s hard to believe the United States government was ever debt-free.

But it happened once – in 1835 – thanks to President Andrew Jackson. He was the first and only president to pay off the national debt completely.

One biographer says the former president viewed debt as a “moral failing,” a sort of “black magic.”

When he became president, Jackson was determined to rid the US of its national debt. After all, debt enslaves you to your creditors.  Continue reading

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