Peak Prosperity - How to Avoid Becoming a Victim of Financial Scammers. Long Bonds Say, “Creak! Pop!”

Episode Date: July 11, 2025

Beware the scammers! They are picking up the pace and the sophistication of their techniques. And also beware the signals from the long bond markets. Creak! Pop!Click Here for Peak Financial Investing

Nothing in this program should be considered investment advice. It is for educational purposes only Please hit pause and read this disclaimer in full These people will spend months planning on what they're doing and I'm like hey Chris Just want to make sure you're sending out this distribution like hey Paul. It's good. I'm doing it for this and it's AI using your voice The following is the audio version of a video released at peakprosperity.com. Visit peakprosperity.com to watch the video and to find other insightful content such as articles, discussion forums, and exclusive subscriber only content. Hello everyone, and welcome to this episode of Finance U, where we bring you all the financial

news that you can use. And I am Chris Martenson, your host, and today I'm back with Kiker, wealth management specialist, Paul Kiker. Hey, Paul, good to see you. Good to see you as well, Chris. Good to see you. Missed talking to you last week. I know, and people said they missed us talking as well.

So very important topic this time. We have to talk about fraud. I believe that it is being fueled by AI. It's highly sophisticated. It's the dark side of AI. Nobody wants to talk about it. Oh my gosh, Grok is going to give me a better recipe. But what are you experiencing?

What have you been seeing over the past few weeks? I've never seen anything like it. And this is probably the closest that I'll come to dropping a string of expletives while we're talking because I'm very careful about that, but I am so angry about it. So this is my 28th year in the financial services industry. I have never seen anything like what has occurred within the past week to two weeks. Well, they probably started about three weeks ago. We started finding out about two weeks ago.

And all the years prior to the past three weeks, I've never seen, and it's not only with the clients that we were aware of, it's also neighbors of the elderly. I mean, and this is, you know, you see that from time to time, but like I've never seen this much. I've not had a day and a conversation since, really in the past two weeks that I've not heard of some type of either neighbor theft or fraud.

And the level of sophistication is unbelievable. And these weren't using AI yet, okay? That's the thing that's so scary and frustrating about it. So that's one thing I wanna talk about today is just point out to people a few things that you can do to protect yourself. Well, let's, without giving anything away that you can't for privacy reasons,

can you give us an example of how one of these frauds might operate? Yeah, so this is gonna hit home with your followers at peak prosperity and peak financial because what's the one asset that we've really liked over the years, Chris, that you've talked about? Yes, okay. So I'm not gonna use the names of the companies or anything,

but here's the scenario. So this individual has been a client of mine for 25 years. Husband passed away probably five years ago. She is a very intelligent lady, okay? Early 80s, but very intelligent, very open, have a great relationship, you know, anytime we talk. So she knows not to click on, you know, spam email. She's very careful about what she utilizes. But here was one of the mistakes. So here's advice number one for listeners out there. I would recommend from this point forward

because it's getting so sophisticated, any of your banking accounts, your brokerage accounts, have one email account for those and use that email account for nothing else. Okay, because one, it isolates. The second thing is use a password that you don't use anywhere else, which is ridiculously complicated, and you can back it up somewhere, but that's one thing that could help. So anyway, these individuals kept trying to

get into her. She updates her security on her email, you know, pretty diligent as far as things go, because we send letters out on a pretty regular basis and talk to people about it. So she's educated, stays on top of it. But she never clicked on anything. But in one of the major company hacks, one of her passwords that she had as her email was gotten off the black market.

And some international organization just keeps working these passwords, right? So they get enough information to know what her password is, what her email, not her email password, but it was another institution's password. Well, it happened to work. So they hack her email, right? So she doesn't know this.

So they got this from somewhere else. She didn't click on anything. And then they start maneuvering around and she gets this number that pops up on the computer that says, hey, you've been breached. Please call this number. Well, don't call the number that comes up on your computer. Rule number one, close that computer down, take it to a local IT professional, have them scrub that thing completely. So she calls the number, a little suspicious. And this is where it gets really interesting. They told her to do a Google search, said, look,

don't give us your information, OK? Hang up the phone with us, do a Google search of your financial institution, and call the phone number that comes up. Well, we don't know how this happened. So there's two theories that we know right now. Either one, that financial institution had a dormant phone number that they directed her to a specific department and

they had ported that over. That's one possibility. What seems the most logical based on the research that we looked at, because some of the authorities are still kind of working on this, is that they were in her computer so when she google searched you know and pulled up on the computer it gave the number to them so she calls verifies information they said yes you have been compromised and here's where so so here's where all kinds of red flags come up so for listeners listeners out there, let's step through it.

They said, first off, we're gonna need to do a few of these things. I'll get into that in a minute. But after they take her through how she's been hacked and her identity's been stolen, the first thing you need to do is be quiet about this. Don't tell your financial advisor, don't tell your family, don't tell your friends, because't tell your family don't tell your friends because they'll be compromised too okay now that's if she didn't yeah

she didn't catch that red flag because she was so scared because at this point she'd gone through everything that she knows do a Google search don't call the number that they called you there so it scares her mm-hmm So anyway, so it goes from there. She's quiet about it, doesn't say anything, really believes that she's working with the Department of Treasury. So these people looked like the Department of Treasury and told her, said, there's two things that you need to do. Let's take your check in account and let's buy Treasury bonds.

Okay? One of the things that you and I've talked about here is treasury bonds are technically the safest investment you can own as a US citizen because FDIC is a government agency, technically it could fail. So, so you know, letters and stuff like that. She's like, she told me she says, well, I know Paul likes treasury bonds, so this will be okay. And at this point, she still hadn't had any still

hadn't talked to me about it, none of my team, but thinks that she's okay. So she sends them over, they send her an email with, you know, receipt of her treasury bonds. She does Google search to compare it. They must have done that with AI because it looked real. So the next step was they said, look, you need to call your, your financial institution, have them liquidate all of your accounts and find any company that will buy gold for you, put 100% of it in the goal, have it shipped to your house. We'll have somebody from the department of treasury come pick that up from you and

put it in safekeeping until we get your identity safe and everything resolved. Whoa. So so that's more red flags, of course, like red flags. But here's here's the thing. Here's the thing that I've learned in all of these stories that I've seen over the year. Emotions take over. And, you know, and I focus on those a lot because I've got to best your plan, not your emotions. But even when it comes to this and I'll get to a couple of tips here in a minute. So so she she calls in, gives a story about somebody starting a business that we had talked about

two or three years ago, and requests the distribution. So I was out of the office, and Carrie messaged me, and I was like, no, that's okay. She's talked about that, but still question her, you know, because you don't want to take it out of your retirement accounts. That's taxable. I'm going to do a 60-day rollover. So she did take that and go back to them. So hey, can we have this resolved in 60 days because I don't want to pay taxes on retirement accounts.

They're like, yes. So long story short, she sends the funds down to a gold institution, purchases the gold and praised the Lord that this institution said, is somebody telling you to do this? Because this is unusual at your age. Now, we all know some of those institutions that are out there that we don't do business with, they don't care about anything except for the sale. So this firm was out of Atlanta, I'm going to give them high regards because they stepped in there. And she said that was the one question.

So she picks up the phone, calls the office and starts asking Carrie, which is on our team and Carrie's worked with me for 21 years. She handles all that. And she's like, you know, this is so and so you're getting a scan. We got to stop this. Of course I get involved and we get as much as we can reversed. She's not going to recover everything. The institution, you know, because here's the thing, it's not appropriate for her to

be 100% in physical metals. If I was going to hold one asset, I would, but it's still not appropriate in her circumstance. So they're going to bust the trade. The good thing is, is she still lost the 5% commission that they had on there. That's the good thing. But they could have charged her the five percent commission to buy and the five percent commission to sell. So I give them a little bit of kudos for that. And we got everything reversed.

But there's so many lessons in there that we generated a letter, not only email letter, we sent out a physical letter just to make sure everybody gets it. And I know as I'm talking through this and we know this is a fraud, there's all kinds of red flags that show up, right? But they had enough, she had gone through the little steps that she knew, and everything seemed to check out, and then emotions took over, because they're telling her,

kids are gonna get wiped out if they say anything, that we're gonna get wiped out. She's like, I love all y'all. I didn't want to get you involved. So, you know, I spent a lot of time just kind of saying, hey, praise the Lord that because if you didn't, if they'd have shown up at your house and you'd have delivered that gold over to them, one, if you survived that, two, you would have never seen it again and you would have been completely wiped out and there's nothing you could do. So the bottom line is when we're around $60,000 is just completely vaporized. It's already out of the country.

They can't track it. They think it came out of India is where they think it came from. So and that's one of three others that have that we have been involved in and basically been able to stop within the past two weeks and And and it's unprecedented me because every one of them were slightly different But here's the common thing for you listeners out there one thing. I want to point out. They're social security scans. There's there's VA scans Social Security is not gonna call you you. They're not going to call you. First off, I don't want to be too rude because I'm sure there's people out there that work with Social Security, but they're not really proactive. Okay? Like if you want to call and set an appointment

with them, I mean, those of you that have called, you're going to be on the phone for 45 minutes to an hour before you get somebody that's like, what do you want? No, I can't do that. Schedule an appointment. There's just not that customer service level. So the second thing is, is they're not gonna call you with demands that tell you you're gonna lose your social security or anything else. So one thing that I have noticed in one of the other scams, all this media stuff that doges shutting social security

down, that's one. The second thing is social security's going bankrupt, you know, all this stuff. That scares people, especially the ones that have a little bit and they're living month to month, paycheck to paycheck on a fixed income with inflation as high as it is. So one, the IRS is not going to call you out of the blue and tell you that they're going to arrest you and that they're going to confiscate everything you have. Social Security is not going to do that. So when somebody that claims to be with a Department of Treasury or the IRS or Social Security calls you out of the blue, just ignore

it. Don't even engage in conversation. You're better off to let the government show up and arrest you and put it in court because then you are, because it's not going to go there. You know you're going to be in trouble with the IRS before they show up. They're going to send you letters. They're going to go there. You know you're going to be in trouble with the IRS before they show up. They're going to send you letters. They're going to send you certified letters. You're going to have all kinds of information. Social Security is not going to stop it.

But the one thing that I recommend is that's first off, just ignore those calls. And this is another level that I tell people. If you think that your computer's been hacked, if you get a message that says your computer's been compromised, call this number. Even my in-laws about a year ago didn't call me. My mother-in-law called my wife and said,

hey, I'm on the way to Walmart to buy some gift cards because our computer got hacked and we got to give them $300. And Holly called me. It was already too late by the time they give him the numbers I'm like don't do that so you know just don't respond from that don't at this point don't even do an internet search on your laptop or your computer if it's been hacked and you've got that signed use your phone okay use something else because if it's if they did have the ability to manipulate that Google, you know, internet search, I don't know if it was Google that she used.

I think I said it earlier, but the internet search to pull up with that number, then that's a whole nother level of sophistication that I have not seen before. Know your local, so another thing, take all of the phone numbers of the institutions you work with, like us, have it in your local. So another thing, take all of the phone numbers of the institutions you work with. Like us, have it in your phone. If it's your bank, have it in your phone. Save so that you don't even have to do an internet search.

And one of the things you can do if you're scared and you want to make sure you're okay, there's a thing called, the technical term, Carrie can tell you, but I know Fidelity is really good about this. They run reports of emails that are going out that have been compromised, and we've had notifications where we come in on a Monday and Fidelity says, hey, this account has been compromised. We have lifted and dropped. So they pick up their funds out of an IRA with account number ending in X. They drop it into a new one and they'll lock down anybody signing in until they go and have a professional scrub their laptop or their computer and let us know

that it's clear. Your banking institution can do a lift and drop. So they can change your account numbers, they can change your passwords. You can put special codes and two-factor authentication on there. So we had somebody targeting us about four months ago, was ridiculously sophisticated on the corporate level. So we put a special code on that only I know on the accounts so that if somebody did, because my social security number is out there over the investment world, they used to put it on every application, right? So they get my data birth, social security number, email address, and happen to find a password or crack it somehow, they still can't make any changes without having that code. So I am so I'm so upset about it Chris and and the emotional stress that this pushes puts people through This may sound heartless

But I fully believe that there should be capital punishment and death penalty for these organizations that are doing this to the elderly Because because the pain that it it it's not only the loss of their assets It's the humiliation, it's the embarrassment, it's the emotional pain, it's the, you know, and depression can really affect somebody's health. And people spin off into depression. Now we've not had a client that's been wiped out, but I've run into people over the years that are around town that have been wiped out.

We all hear these stories when you go places. In a lot of cases, they don't live very long because they're so depressed and just kind of spiral down. So for everybody that's out there, if anything, one, I'll repeat it again, get an email address that you don't use for anything else, for any of your financial accounts, anything that's very important. Don't forward it to anybody, don't use it, that helps to keep it off the radar, it's not bulletproof.

Make sure you're using a password that you've never used anywhere else. And furthermore, about once every six months, change that password, update it. I know it's hard, okay? I have, I think I've got like 75 different passwords that we have to use for logins and we make them ridiculously complicated. We have to do that to protect it from client side. If you can do a two factor authentication, do so. Because that's just another level.

It's not guaranteed because I have seen scams out there where somebody ported your cell phone number over to them. And that's not even talking about AI being used at this point, right? So we've actually put in some extra protocols and implementations in place because AI can replicate somebody's voice. You know, Chris, you could call the office and say, hey, I want X amount of dollars and I just hypothetical scenario for you listeners. But you could call that. Well, I know you, right?

So I pick up the phone and call and verify you. But somebody's ported your phone number over because these people will spend months planning on what they're doing. And I'm like, Hey, Chris, just want to make sure you're sending out this distribution. Like, Hey, Paul, it's good. I'm doing it for this. And it's AI using your voice. So I don't know how the government fix this fixes this, but what I have noticed, and I've reached out to a couple of other advisors as well that I maintain relationships, you

know, different parts of the country. They're saying the same thing right now that they've never seen this level of fraud attempts and Accomplishments that they've seen in their whole careers either and just about all of them are at least 15 years or more mmm Yeah, I unfortunately know already of two peak prosperity members who who lost money and it's everything you described They have the shame, the regret, the loss of confidence, it's just a big blow to their sense of self.

Yeah, the money's the minimal part. So I wanna tell the listeners out there, if you've been compromised the first thing, a predator took advantage of the society that we're in. In hindsight, you're always going to look back and say, I could have done something different. Okay? So, it's human nature to blame yourself. But in reality, you shouldn't have to be dealing with a society that allows that.

Our government has gutted the protections for our citizens through the, you know, the FBI has been a joke over the years and the local police departments are so understaffed, they really can't do anything. We just haven't had a government that has put levels of protection in place to help us, much less move fast enough to keep up with it. So the first thing is, is do everything that you can do to not blame yourself. When it comes in, grab those thoughts, cast them down. It is what it is. You got to do the best that you can on the other side. The second thing is, do not let your embarrassment of not understanding what's going on to pick up the phone and call your kids, your banker, your investment advisor, you know, reach out to people and let them know what's going on. And here's the

thing. If you don't know what to do, you know, I'm not saying don't do anything, you want to notify the institutions and get those accounts moved. But if you don't know what to do and you think it's a fraud because they're telling you they're going to show up and arrest you tomorrow, let them. Let them arrest you. Okay? There's protections within the government system that's going to protect you in the court, especially if you're elderly, and they're going to be understanding that this is complicated. And it's not going to come out of the blue. My argument is, is if you don't know what to do because you're scared that they're going to arrest you tomorrow if you don't do anything and this is out of the blue, do nothing. Let them arrest you and fight it in the courts if it's really

improved that you didn't do anything wrong. But, and just communicate, reach for help. Don't be too proud to reach out and ask. I mean, I had to. So when they convinced me enough, because when they called me, they're like, hey, this is so and so from, you know, the, I don't want to use the name of the bank with, but from the bank that I'm bank with, well, I know her name, like I know her. Okay. But I don't know her well enough to know her voice. I know who she is. So I was like, okay, I'm just going to pick up the phone and call. And I was about to, she's like, Paul, I know who you are, your date of birth is X, and your social security number is X. And I'm like, how'd you have my social security number? Like, and I'm like,

I don't care. I don't care if you know it or not. I'm still calling the bank. Well, I hung up the phone. And I drove to the local bank branch and explained what happened. I said, Hey, have you got these transactions for fraudulent wires that are requested out on an account? They're like, we don't see anything. And when I shared them from there, they knew your social security number, which is not uncommon because it's been out there used to in the industry. Every account had it on there.

So then I'm like, okay, what can we do to protect this? And there's levels. So if you're concerned, before it happens, go put special pins on your accounts, get an email address just for complicated password. Those are not gonna guarantee that you can't end up in a situation, but that's gonna raise the bar to where you're at least like what you tell people, Chris,

don't be low hanging fruit. Don't be low hanging fruit. Yep, well, and then I think there needs to be the three factor, which would be low hanging fruit. Don't be low hanging fruit. Yep, well and then I think there needs to be the three factor which would be a firm like yours standing there, right, being savvy to this, having seen it and all of that where I would feel better knowing that people had their two factor authentication and took the email and did what they could.

But even still, sometimes you need somebody there who can make a judgment call on your behalf or do some more sleuthing or something right so I Wow yeah no and it's AI is gonna make it worse we all know it is because Paul they're gonna know you right they're gonna know your weakness and maybe they'll decide that you know your your weakness is your children or something something right they'll find everybody's little weaknesses. And then they'll just be these machines that they just hit a button and they make thousands

of calls until they find a couple of live wires and chase that, you know, that's how it's going to be. Mm-hmm. That's right. That's right. And then there was, there was one other situation, which is a little bit darker of somebody that I knew that was elderly, and they would have their computer up,

and then they get, it was in their bedrooms, they go to the bathroom, take shower, left it up. So somebody had hacked and they're like, hey, when you went to the bathroom the other day, we've got pictures of you without any clothes on, and we're gonna send them to the local paper, we're gonna post them on Facebook, we're gonna do all this stuff

if you don't pay us $100,000. Because they explained it to know whether they had the pictures or not I don't know but you know His kids called and we got to talking about it and they're like dad looks so what if somebody sees a picture of you You know, we'll all laugh about it, but don't send them the money, right? They didn't send the money got somebody somebody to scrub the computer. Pictures never popped up. But the only reason that the son found out about it and got us involved is he stopped by to visit the dad next morning, hadn't slept all night, had had tears, like literal tears. He's like, I've never seen my dad cry. What the heck's going on? And found out, you know, kind of he's

like, son, I'm sorry, it's gonna be embarrassing if I don't pay this money and I don't want you or the grandkids to have to see that. So there's all kinds of areas where they're gonna try to blackmail you to get in there. And if you're not sure, I don't have the website in front of me right now, but for clients we send it out to, it's there, contact the Federal Trade Commission.

After you reach out to your banks immediately, contact the Federal Trade Commission and notify you reach out to your banks immediately, contact the Federal Trade Commission and notify them of what's going on. They may be slow, but they still have resources that'll get in there to try to stop this. And at a minimum, they'll at least notify people of the scam because they're, what I have noticed is with AI, they're getting much,

even if it's just the research information that they have, they're getting much more sophisticated. And again, here too, if they're getting much, even if it's just the research information that they have, they're getting much more sophisticated. And again, here too, if they hack your computer, used to they'd spend six months going through your emails and reading. Now they can scrub it with AI and learn everything about every email that you have in your computer at the snap of a finger. So things are moving faster. So please, please, if in doubt, call everybody you can. I don't know one banker that wants to have to go

through the process of tracing those funds down for you. And I don't know one advisor who wants to have a client on their watch get scammed from their brokerage account. And I don't know one advisor that wants to get scanned in the intermediate with a client on their watch gets scammed from their brokerage account. And I don't know one advisor that wants to get scanned in the intermediate with a client because if we send funds out, this is what I tell clients, if somebody gets scammed and we send funds out,

we're liable for that. Because it's not the broker dealers, it's the ones of us that send out. So it's our job to protect clients and to protect ourselves and protect everybody involved as well. Yeah, and I'm just gonna quickly point out because this is a great time to just sort of raise this as an idea

Paul that I've run lots of interviews with Glenn Meter and he runs something called Privacy Academy and they have a really really good offering for getting your digital hygiene up to snuff. I use it it's really good and I think if anybody wants you can just come in and just come to Peak Prosperity, Glenn, 2Ns, MEDER, M-E-D-E-R, and then you can watch our podcast and then see if you're interested. But it's really important to take those basic steps here for your digital hygiene.

That's a great resource. So I encourage anybody to go out and listen to that. Anything you can do to protect yourself and learn about that. Don't live in fear, but what I'm trying to put out is, you know, Proverbs is my favorite book and twice in Proverbs it says, the prudent foresee danger and hide themselves but the simple pass on or judge for it. So just be prudent, okay, and understand there are predators out there. I'm seeing a level of selfishness.

Well, and it's stacked towards the predators, right? Because you can go onto Reddit to say, you know, privacy, rprivacy or rslashfinance or something. And you'll read account after account after account. Somebody says, a hacker came in, stole some money. I alerted my bank within the 24 hour window and the bank says, tough. You know, nothing we can do about it your loss, right?

Even though they're supposed to be the ones safeguarding against that and these people had done nothing wrong And then they go through all these fights and then they have to go to the consumer finance protection board and try and get somebody Else involved and it's just it's it's just a giant. It's stacked against you, right? It is it is and another piece of advice that I'll lay out there is don't use debit cards. Just don't use debit cards. Because in my experience, debit cards, and it's a dangerous thing to tell people because some people can't, don't have the discipline to keep their credit cards under control. But if you can pay your credit cards off every month, don't waste that interest, then don't use the debit cards.

Cause it's much harder to get a fraudulent charge reversed in most cases, at least the experience that I've helped clients get through with a debit card than is credit card. Typically a credit card you're gonna call say, that's not me. And then they're gonna write that off with it. Whereas a debit card, I have had clients that didn't catch it soon enough and they never got the money back

Okay, and and it and and it can be five ten fifteen thousand dollars or more at times that people that have accumulated before they realize it So I'm not a big fan I keep a debit card for emergency purposes if I need cash when I'm out somewhere But I don't use it for normal transactions because that's just and that's a direct link to your checking account Where at least with a credit card you've've got the buffer. And, and hey, the benefit is if you pay that credit card off every month, you're going to accumulate some points. You're going to be careful about that because people spend themselves in oblivion just to get points, but you're going to,

you're going to accumulate some points in there. And it's a win-win across the board because you've got an extra level of protection that's inside of there. And the credit card companies build that in as a part of their business. So, you know, we're working on trying to do a whole step-by-step, you know, um, update that we'll send out each year. Hey, these are the new scams. These are new for all of us to watch out for. And, and just be aware of this.

If you have any questions, pick up the phone, call us and, and we'll, you know, direct you to the right place or help make sure that you do what you need to do to protect yourself. Well, thank you for that important message. But the summary is that this is happening with greater and greater frequency right now. Yes. For whatever reasons, but I think AI is probably helping to break some doors down on that because it helps them. AI is probably you know helping to break some doors down on that because it helps them You know AI is pattern identification

So if you said I need vulnerable 80 year olds with substantial assets it can help you find that pattern of people right? Yes, it can and I need there as much data as I can get about them right on the both the light and the dark web Right whatever you I could see firms out there just trolling away and harvesting all this stuff Developing target lists and chewing through them until they get to success, right? So just part of it. Just don't be loaning fruit You know, no and if they want you to pay them in gold or Bitcoin or gift cards You're getting scammed. Yeah. Yeah, if the Treasury Department asks you for gift cards is probably a scam Yeah, yeah, that should be obvious. But anyway, I laugh. And another one that I've seen is, you know,

a elderly widow in the early eighties with a beautiful foreign girl that that wants, you know, that's 25 years old that wants to marry him, but she needs the money to get over the United States. The oldest scam in the book. Yeah. You're probably talking to a 600 pound individual sitting behind there that is no representative of where they are. I'm just trying to paint, you know, job of the huts, which you're looking at for those of you that have seen Star Wars and is behind the picture. But it's unfortunately, Chris, we're in a society where weakness reigns and the base desires of humanity

leads to the point that just about everybody's—you have to assume that everybody's trying to get in your pocket for their own benefit. That's not the truth. You and I both know that. We know a lot of people that would lay their life down if they knew that it would change the trajectory of this country, and especially for their families. But you have to get people to earn your trust in demonstrating it over time, and the more they try to spend time saying, oh, I'm this, you know, oh, I'm a Christian, or I'm

this, you know, oh, I've got these kids and I'm family. When they're leading that with you, just think they're trying to give you as much information to grab your heartstrings so that you'll trust them while they're reaching into your pocket one way or another. And another thing that I've seen is, you know, neighbors that are helping people, I've seen nonprofits and churches and institutions where people are stealing. And unfortunately, most of your district attorneys are not going to prosecute someone if they're if it's less than 150,000 if it is you're gonna have to hire a forensic audit I mean I was on

the board of a booster club years ago for kids and we we caught somebody I caught somebody stealing $30,000 and we weren't gonna be able to get the money and I told the DA, I said, hey, if you don't press charges against this for the little kids, I'm going to rent the cover of the paper every week for the next, for the six months prior to your election and remind everybody that you refuse to go after this. And they're like, well, okay. But, you know, the reality is it was a small enough town that that matters in a big city it may not they They just don't seem to care and I think it's because they're understaffed. They don't have the the

The police is not staffed to the point to be able to deal with this because they got so many other things that they're having To deal with no, but these are sophisticated complicated cases so hard for the DA to win Sometimes police let me be blunt usually don't have the capability in-house No, but these are sophisticated complicated cases so hard for the DA to win sometimes police Let me be blunt usually don't have the capability in-house To actually really forensically go down that stuff because it's fairly specialized stuff that you have to turn to build through So I get that all right Well, thanks for that important message Can we turn to the markets real quick?

Absolutely, I'm done. I'm done with my rant now guys. So thank you So, please just protect yourself All right. Well, thank you for the rant very important very timely Holger shapes its Shapets I She's shape its I never know how to pronounce that but Holger says good morning from Germany where bond markets are starting to show Signs of nervousness. We're looking at a 10-year yield in Germany. This is a real rate of return. So these would be negative real rates down here and these

are positive real rates. But you can see it's a pretty violent reversal here for Germany, right? Still fairly low rates. But it's, is that a sea change? Well that's the 10-year bond. Oops, the UK 30-year, guilt is the way they say Treasury bond, their official government bond guilt Gilt not GUI LT the 30-year guilt soaring right? That's a pretty big blowout right there going from 4 to 4 5 4 to 5 5 2 to 5 4 You know pretty quick anyway UK 30-year papers blown out Japan's 30-year paper is blown out. I mean I papers blown out japan's thirty-year papers blown out and i mean blown out

uh... and laurence mcdonald here wrote quote japan was planned to respond yield anchor for decades when central bankers distort the true cost of capital over longer and longer periods of time there's a price to pay for this it's not free he had a really nice long thread under this the uh... next piece i want to talk about because this gets to my, the point I want to get to here, he says, when interest rates rise, obviously, existing bond prices

fall because they're a seesaw, right? So rates and prices. And so the, Apple's 2.55% bonds due in 2060, Paul, people sat down and bought paper from Apple yielding two point five five percent There wasn't gonna get paid back till 2060. Well, if you had to sell that bond right now Let's say you bought it a hundred cents on the dollar at par back in the day because it made sense to buy Triple a paper from Apple at two point five five percent Well, if you had to sell that bond today, you'd get about fifty seven cents on the dollar back So if you bought a thousand dollars worth you get about 570 back huge capital losses Right, where's that? $430 it's missing in action, right?

So, okay Well, then we he points out that the Bank of Japan's balance sheet has trillions on it trillions and he says quote losses are in The trillions they are smoking in the dynamite shed in Tokyo and Washington the Bank of Japan holds 52% of all outstanding government bonds for bet for Japan's government bonds. So that means that if if Japan's bonds are Yields are blowing out that means prices are falling because again they go opposite So the Bank of Japan sitting on massive losses. That's what that's how you read this chart. Massive losses, sudden massive losses for the Bank of Japan, right? And the losses are in the trillions and I

know you'll remember this because I'm old enough to remember 2020 when there was almost 19 trillion dollars of what we called negative yielding debt. Nobody knows what that means Paul. It's a crazy idea where I have to give money to Germany to lend them money. For instance, I'll pay you to pay me back last. I'll pay you to lend you money. Yeah. Anyway, but they went from 19 trillion to zero over just three years. Paul, those are losses. Everybody who held or bought paper here with negative yield is just nursing massive losses.

OK, where are those losses? Where are they? Where are they? Well, some of it's on the Federal Reserve balance sheet. Some of it's on the Bank of Japan balance sheet. Some of it's on official balance sheet. Some of it, I think, is on the insurance companies' balance sheets who've been just absolutely skewering people,

particularly younger people, with auto insurance rates. I think some of it's in pensions, some of it's in endowments. Some of it will be on the Harvard endowment, you know? But what happened was the Federal Reserve decided in the context of the Lehman crisis to never let us have another crisis. And they printed whatever it took, which means they killed Joseph Schumpeter's creative destruction, right?

Didn't happen. And this is now just stacked wood, stacked wood. If the forest ever catches fire, Paul, it's just nothing but stack wood. I think there's something, it's just, I think mistakes were made. I believe so. You know, and those charts remind me, interest rates were going down for so long. There's really not anybody that's professionally managing money now that understands what the rising rate environment is. There are a few, right, that are still in the buffet, remembers what rising rates were like,

but from 1982 it's been consistently down. Then you had the government, you know, putting their hands on that basketball or beach ball of what interest rates should be, and it looks like they held it underwater for so long algae started forming and they shipped their hands just a little bit. The rates have jumped up. And even in the US here recently, supposedly the Fed's like, there's a little talk of we could cut rates in July is what I saw a headline here a minute ago. But interest rates are starting to creep up again in the US. And understandably so because if they're going to go all in and have no fiscal restraint whatsoever, who in their right mind wants to own a 20 or 30 year bond right now for a long term investment? I see it as a trade in the short run because of what may happen over the next

six months or so potentially. But why would you own 20 or 30 years unless you're forced to if the government's just going to print their way out of this? I can't think of a single good fiduciary reason. You know, I interviewed Mitch Vexler. He was saying we have the same problem on the Muni side. So municipalities have been rolling their debt, rolling, rolling, rolling, but there's no plan for how it could ever be paid back. And easy cursory intro spreadsheet level sort of an examination of these things as they can't they can't pay them back like

like the value of the outstanding bonds in some municipalities exceeds anything that could realistically be harvested from the real estate taxes over time yeah what was the line that he said I thought it was amazing I didn't think about it to you just mentioned it, that they were worth a whole lot more than the houses and the houses, even if you sold them all, couldn't even cover the bonds in one institution. If it continued, right? I can't remember exactly.

It's a Ponzi scheme. Yeah. Oh yeah. Just, so you have all that going on. So all of this is going on, but the only plan I've detected so far is we're just going to keep printing, I guess, you know, that's what it seems to be. I mean, that's what governments have done throughout history. What's going to be more painful in this circumstance is not just Argentina this printing or Zimbabwe this printing. It seems to be that the global governments of the world have decided to

do all this together. And I think that's what makes it so painful because you're looking at the dollar. Yeah, the dollar's got a little bit of weakness in here right now. And I think that's probably going to continue. But for the most part, what good does it do to watch the dollar if all of the currencies are linked to it and the dollar is going down in value in relation to that? You know, and, and, um, and the, and the worst part about it is this, it's artificially held these markets and kept them going. We talked about

this what a couple of weeks ago, John Husband talking about just how much of an outlier and where we are right now and the how likely it is to have negative returns over the next 12 years. We're in a we're in a dangerous situation. We really are. Well, you know, the the bullishness that i have called the sides you know big piece by piece i'm not just comprehensively bearish on these areas i see bright spots uh... you know energy and precious metals and certain types of real estate but but generally speaking

the the team i have is that we've had this interventionist federal reserve in federal government with also with this public-private partnership because they couldn't do it alone right the feds Powerful institution, but they don't hold the control control of the trading reins You know that would be a public-private partnership with a Black Rock or a citadel You need you need your big heavy-duty players in there who who can do this stuff But since that happened, you know, we haven't had what I call a normal market because Braavos Research just had a nice thread here. There's the link down there on X. Said history's repeating, buckle up. But you see here, Paul, we have these, things

are really starting to fall and then there's just overnight, one night it's always at night, you get these magic nipple bottom V reversals, right? You know thing 2025 coming into the you know the April you know tariff tantrums you see these reversals and and they're not organic right they they are engineered and manipulated because somebody's decided that it's really important that these things not fall right now it's never a good time right but because of, you get that stacked wood, you know, and this is now a global phenomenon as far as I'm concerned, right? And my poster child for that we've talked about is the German Dax, which I understand has some components that sort of may have an offshore outside of Germany component to

it. But generally speaking, like this thing is just on stoppable it just been just this is a whole big one point six seven percent giant green candle to the upside germany to what kind of news came out of germany today there's like nothing not involved in a journey story real gdp dead flat for five years gone nowhere here's their pre-covid trend in the green dotted line is just gone

nowhere but Five years gone nowhere. Here's their pre-COVID trend in the green dotted line. It's just gone nowhere, but it just keeps powering higher and higher. This is just the last year, by the way. Right? This is, goes back five years. Oh, how about, how about the retail sales? Oh gosh, they're actually down pretty handily from just recently. They're not doing good. Well, okay.

What, what about industrial production? Cause you know, that's how Germany makes its money. That's an even worse story. This is really bad. You know, so know, that's how Germany makes its money. That's an even worse story. This is really bad You know, so gosh, that's weird, but their stock market keeps going up. Yep. Here's the GDP Here's the German DAX. They are separated wildly. This only comes through to 2024. It's even worse now, so Why are markets and so this is just to pick on the German DAX? I can show you the same thing for equivalent for Japan

for the US for the footsie What's what's driving this I like to say it's investors, but I'm gonna use my air quotes. It's not investors per se It's not investors per se. That's a really good question, Chris. It doesn't make sense to me. So the only thing that I can, there are things that do make sense.

Can I explain exactly what a gamma squeeze is so that average person will understand it? No. And I'm a believer that if you don't understand enough to teach it to a five-year-old, then you really don't understand it. So I don't understand it, but I can grab the concept enough. The derivatives market is such a behemoth out there right now, which is what my, where I'm, have the greatest concern about the potential of the great taking being unraveled from. But there are technical factors that are pushing money flow.

Okay, so that's one thing that could be exacerbating these markets of where they are. The second thing is Mike Green, Professor Plum or Prof Plum on X has done a really good job laying out a thesis with others that the passive investing into the S&P 500 and the 401k inflows and all the US chasing momentum and money returns, they're price-incensive buyers. And he had an interview lately that he explained, if you and I want to go into a rug shop and we say, hey, how much is that rug? And they say, $2,000. We'll say, how about we give you $1,500? And they come back with $1,750, and you say, how about $1,600? Deal, right?

But what, this was the greatest explanation that I've heard of from indexing in a long time because they're price insensitive buyers. That would be like us walking into the road shop and saying, I'll give you $2,000 for that. And they're like, no, it's $2,500. Okay, I'll take it. No, I'm sorry, it's $3,000. Okay, I'll give you $2,000 for that." And they're like, no, it's 2,500. Okay, I'll take it. No, I'm sorry, it's 3,000.

Okay, I'll take it. Sorry, it's 5,000. Okay, I'll take it. That's a great explanation of what passive investing is, and that's why I don't believe it's gonna end well. So I think a lot of that, and especially whatever happened after COVID in this long period of time

where these markets have been consistently bailed out, on top of that retail investors has become bulletproof. I mean that their retail investors that I know people that got have been wiped out several times in the past that lend more towards gambling that are so confident in their ability to navigate these markets perfectly, but bull markets make everybody look like a genius. Okay. So I think you have that euphoria on top of because they don't care. So this is one interesting chart that I'll show you with bar chart here to answer that

long-winded answer to that question. I'm talking to you to today guys. I apologize so Retail investors bought 155 billion worth of stocks in the first half of this year the most in us history Okay, so if we can make that a little bit bigger. I know I haven't figured out how to make it perfect. Wow, but look at that since 2020 Yes So it just like what changed? Wow.

Right. So this euphoria has continued and is just continuing to grow. So these are first half, we got close to 153 trillion and a billion, excuse me, in the first half of 2022 billion, 153 billion. But we've set the record this year. Well, 2022 was down, the S&P 500 was down 20% that year approximately, I can't remember exactly, and the bond market was as well. So we've got this period of time where retail investors are piling in. What that's doing is feeding the momentum trade, and that's forcing institutions to chase. One of the things we've seen is hedge funds

and institutions recognize the undercurrent of the economy and how tedious it is. Well, they go short. Retail investors just pile in, which forces covering these short squeezes, and then that momentum carries for a while. So I think it's technical factors and we've got a market that's priced to perfection in a world that's simply, what was the quote that I saw?

It was the man king, a market price for perfection in a world that's anything but. That's where we are right now. Yeah, I haven't I can't find a more recent one here, but close enough From June so a little over a month ago roughly a month ago, so we look at Institutional clients they've just been dumping into this private clients have just been buying into this It's one of the biggest gaps on here So yeah pros are selling, retails are buying. Yep. We all know how that story ends. It's the same way every time. It's Lucy and the football. Let me tell you a mile marker that I, a road sign that I had arise two weeks ago. In 2000, February of 2008, I had a client come to me and said, he's passed away now,

but he said, look, he said, I love my daughter-in-law, my son-in-law's a knucklehead. He's making a fortune on real estate right now. He said, I can't stand it, he's just making so much money. If he can do it, I can do it. Pulled absolutely everything out, levered himself to the hilt, bought all the real, you know, real estate that he could. Now, unfortunately, because he levered himself, he didn't get a hold onto it from a long-term standpoint, got wiped out. So what I've been seeing a lot lately is all these fancy derivatives

and options trades and officer good tool to use. They're really sexy But inherently they're very aggressive, right? You're levering large amounts of money and it works and it makes you feel like a genius in a you know in a bull market And I had a elderly lady that's like hell of my son. My son is smart But he's figured this out and he's making a fortune in it. And he's teaching me and I'm going to be doing this, you know, in their midst. And that's fine. I hope that it works out. But they're not, they're not utilizing the risk side of the derivatives market. They're, you know, zero-day expiration options. This, and I'm like, this

thing can blow up really quickly. Be careful. and I'm seeing people that are just getting sucked into this Euphoria right now because inflation is going up You know that you know, they feel it their insurance is going through the roof. They're watching their neighbors, you know Make make fortunes of individuals that they don't necessarily believers intelligent as they are in all cases. Now, we should underestimate our own intelligence for sure. But I'm just seeing this vacuum that's sucking individuals into this market, and they really don't care.

They're like, they fully believe the governments will not let anything go wrong. Well, they may be right. That's a valid point. But my argument is, there's, you know, I'm really bullish on the asset classes, and not a recommendation, but there are commodities that are ridiculously undervalued. There are emerging market economies that are ridiculously undervalued. I mean, there are places like Brazil that look so attractive from a long-term standpoint, even India, not that they won't get in trouble in the short run, that it may be right, but

it may not be the assets they're chasing right now that are the savior they expect them to be. You remember, so Harry Markopolos on a silver platter delivered to the SEC prima facie proof that Bernie Madoff was running a scam right and it was because it was impossible for Bernie to have done as much hedging as he was claiming to have done because of all these options and everything but people wanted to believe Paul you like look my portfolio just goes up 10% every year and by the way I learned from that experience that when something just

goes up into the right like it's on a ruler line, it's fraudulent. And then, oh, hey, look, here's the NASDAQ today. That's just, it's just not natural looking. There's a lot of that going on. But this is the point. Listen, I agree. So that's why I get mad when they say investors. It's not investors. We're speculators because we're speculating that the government's going to bail us all

out. And that may well prove to be a good speculation. Nothing wrong with betting. You want to go, you know, and you see that there's actually 15 more black squares than red squares in the roulette table. Bet black. I get it. Just know that sometimes it lands in the green thing and sometimes it does hit red, right? So that can happen. So but if we all just admit it, look, we're speculating that the Fed is always going to be able to bail this thing out Come hell or high water. That's fine. That's okay. Just know what game you're playing, right?

Now if you want to invest now, you're saying what's a risk-adjusted return? What are the risks because all risks come with with you know, all investments come with risks Sometimes they work sometimes they don't right but the more risk that you're likely to take You should come with a higher level of return, right? Yes, and I'm seeing now that people are taking Extraordinary risks on things and it's like well, what's the return? Well, the return is well, we don't know but the government will bail us out. The Fed won't let the market fall again That may be true But I wouldn't have all my money on that color for sure.

No, it's just not prudent. And are you really willing, with all the knowledge we have about history now, all the times that they've claimed that it was different? And it's dangerous to assume that this time is not different, right? They may print enough to where valuations stay at this permanent high plateau, but there's still going to be some back and forth in there and some equilibrium

that's not going to need to be established at that higher level. Are you really willing to risk what you saved for your entire life, what you sacrificed to speculate? I've said it before, we have to play the game by the rules that are forced upon us. But that doesn't mean that you have to be foolish about it. It doesn't mean that you have to have a fairy tale scenario that this is always going to work out. Because when these markets are priced to perfection, when everything under the surface has changed, something anything could come out of the blue. I mean, my goodness, we could have a massive earthquake within the United States that could

absolutely unravel everything, and they can print all the money in the world, but it's not going to solve the problem real quick. It's just going to exacerbate the inflation. So we have a lot of pride in our government institutions right now, a lot of arrogance that they can control an unknowable future. And unfortunately, we've got to make a choice. You either have to make a choice. You either choose to say, I believe the passive thing.

I believe that they're gonna save this and you walk that path. But at least understand that if it's not different this time and mathematics matter, this market could go down 60 or 70%. Can you endure that? You know, you might have euphoria in the beginning, but there's still gonna be pain in that process because it's gonna take discipline to walk that journey.. Or you say, you know what? I want

to walk the path less traveled because the path less traveled requires giving up a little bit now, a little discipline. Maybe you're not making as much as everybody else because you've got to, you know, you've got, you're standing close to the exit. But now you're in a position that you're not going to get wiped out if it's not different this time. And you're flexible enough if you're in a position that you're not going to get wiped out if it's not different this time. And you're flexible enough if you've got a strategy that can help you be adaptive. Hey, I can overweight commodities here, or I can overweight international, or I can do this. I'll add some metals to my portfolio. It's a time to choose to be adaptive and look from a long-term picture or choose to be

Passive and trust that they'll save you and look I haven't seen anything from the government that tells me that that I should put all my faith and trust in them and any Throughout history much less this one much less currently, right? Yeah Yeah, I did have some hope that just got crushed and that's Congress that may be a conversation for the other day And I'm still so upset about that, but you know, they're gonna betray your trust The markets are unraveling and the stakes could not be higher if you're relying on passive strategies or so-called diversification or perhaps using an advisor who is I don know, maybe in elementary school during the great financial crisis, you could be on a collision course with staggering portfolio losses. Peak financial investing is your lifeline.

We handpick wealth managers who will actively manage your portfolio with proven, market-savvy strategies, not the tired, modern portfolio theory that could crumble under pressure. The unprepared will not just lose this time, but lose big. The future that I see consists of both winners and losers, but many more losers this time than last time. Go to peakfinancialinvesting.com today and schedule your free consultation. This is your chance to protect your wealth.

Again, that's peakfinancialinvesting.com. And I'm Dr. Chris Martenson urging you, please don't wait another day. Well, this is a fourth turning moment. And for people who aren't familiar, fourth turning is a title of a book by Neil Howe and Strauss and it describes that there are these periodic cycles that that cultures go through and it's about an 80 year cycle which is four generations of 20 years each right we call them Gen X Gen Y this and that but roughly 20 years and as you go through one of those big cycles, 80 year cycle, the fourth turning is, the name for it is crisis.

And its key feature, Paul, is a loss of faith in your governing institutions, right? And so Evie and I were just talking about this on a live cast, but think about like the reputational, like four years ago, five years ago, Harvard was like, that was it. Like that's the preeminent institution in the world. Now they're the place that forced mandates

on its kids coming in and protected a plagiarizer in her presidential role. Like the CDC, FDA, out the window with that stuff, right? A lot of doctors gone, right? But now we're finding out our judiciary and our prime law enforcement, not worthy of our trust either, right? But now we're finding out our judiciary and our prime law enforcement not worthy of our trust either, right? And worse, they don't seem to even feel like they owe us a proper explanation for anything, right? So again, it's that loss of faith in your governing institutions, which sparks the crisis itself. And then the question becomes, well, okay, but I'm going to

trust that the Federal Reserve is just going to be able to print our way through this crisis. History is not real solid on that one. No, it's not. Doesn't provide a lot of hopeful examples around that. So there's lots of ways to hedge bets and be thoughtful. And I wish we didn't have to, I wish it wasn't this way. I wish we lived in a sound money environment got it

We don't so you play the rules of the game as they're handed to you got it But there are ways to play this I think that people just have to be aware that if you play it with a lot of trust and hope That those are two very bad strategies for this environment, which we'll call the fourth turning environment now You're gonna have to be clever and guess what even if you're the cleverest It might still not work out in your favor because that's how life goes sometimes, but you can stack the odds and I think When the dust settles Paul, there'll be winners and losers just a lot more losers than winners this time Yes, yes

And if they print us into oblivion everybody's gonna going to be a loser in one way or another. Everybody is. You're not going to come through this unscathed. But for those that are prudent and foresee danger and hide themselves, you're going to have a few bumps and bruises, and you're going to be walking past people that are going to be losing limbs. That's the reality of where we're going, if they continue down this path. And that's the reason why I believe it's so important.

It takes a lot more work. It takes discipline. It takes patience. It takes looking where you're going, not looking in the rear view mirror and saying, I wish I had done that. So in all of our lives, how many times have we made mistakes

by making emotional decisions? So I love the Octimus Creed, learn from the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. That's what I'm so upset about what our government institutions are choosing to do now. They're not learning from the mistakes of the past, they're trying to do more of the same of what got us into the situation we're in right now. And isn't that the definition of insanity, if I remember correctly? Well, it is. And to be blunt, what we're getting right now

is not what was sold to us on the campaign trail. No. Just diametrically opposed, right? Yeah. Hey, we're gonna cut spending, short-term pain for long-term gain. I was all on board with that, right? Yep, me too.

And because regardless of whether you're in a risk managed portfolio or not, that's the right thing to do from a long-term standpoint. Okay. But the longer you put the, the, the longer this continues. So we go from here in short-term pain, I'm like, Oh my gosh, they're really going to do it. And then there's a complete flip of the script. Oh, forget it. We're just gonna spend ourselves into oblivion. We're gonna, you know, just stack so much debt and so much burden on the, our children and grandchildren that they're gonna have miserable lives down the future. And we're just gonna party into the sunset. I don't think that, I don't think that generation

is going to come out of this unscathed. And I care deeply about that generation, which is why we do what we do. All generations I care about. Well you know if I could wave my magic policy wand I would allow us to have a competing currency right because I love competition right and then Paul let's say let's say I do some work for you and you're like Chris I can pay you in Federal Reserve notes or in this new Currency that's over here, right? And by the way, this one's backed by something man meaningful and tangible and it's got an open ledger

And you can see what they do and by the way, they can't print it out of thin air I'd be like I'll take those. Oh, I would do you know and then eventually I'd be going I'll take ten of those or a hundred of these fake ones over here and that gap would get So unpaid so painful the Federal Reserve would be forced by competition to address that and they would have to become responsible again Without consequences without competition nothing changes. They just keep doing the same thing over and over again off we go and Innovation is destroyed right like without competition, you don't have innovation. That's one thing that's amazing, reminds you know, Jordan Peterson talked about for a period of time, a couple of years ago, so I may not remember the details.

They were screaming that everybody was going to starve if we didn't do something about the population in the 1970s by 1980s. But humans when they have the ability, we're creative, we fight. And especially some of the most successful individuals that I have seen have just been fired out of the blue. They didn't know what to do. They sat down, they prayed about it, they thought. They found a service that people need, and they went out there and offered that service.

And it was something that nobody gotten before And it bettered the lives of those people and it helped them we need that competition so that we have innovation so that we have a better future instead of Central planning that controls everything Well, you were in college you won the nationals in in water skiing, right? Yeah, I did Congratulations, but thank you, I did. Congratulations. Thank you.

But can you imagine? So imagine that they didn't hold competitions. You just would ski privately, post your times, and at the end of the year, they would sort of post all the times, right? I bet everybody would have really bad times, because you're not competing against or for you know You just sort of like well, I'll do the best I can today But nobody's watching and nothing's gonna happen like it would just be

It's not how it's not all life works No, it's not and I'll tell you what I would have done it is competitive as I am I Would look at the ranking list on the world the top top 25, and I wanted to start picking them off. And I respected them all, but I wanted to pick them off. I want to beat him. And I trained not to beat them. I trained to get better, but I found an older gentleman. I said, hey, I'll coach you to ski

if you'll drive me in the morning, because none of my college friends will get up at daylight. I'll meet you out there at daylight, six o'clock, 6.30 in the morning. I'll train before we go to school. It used to not be easy for me to get up in the morning. If I didn't have that drive to be the best that I could be with the reward of outworking and getting ahead of that person, maybe something, there was a couple of people that I beat that were way up on that list in the

tournament. It was just pure luck. I had a good day. They didn't. But if I hadn't done the work, It was just pure luck. I had a good day. They didn't But if I hadn't done the work if you had a score at the end of the year There's no way I would have woken up at six o'clock in the morning and been out there at the lake when it's cold Skiing when everybody else is sleeping till ten o'clock. I just wouldn't have done it So you're right that that competition is what make things makes us better individually Absolutely, of course We'll see I I'm just, I'm shocked that that the so-called markets are just sort of like skating along here as they are. But that's

just that's just how it goes. And I do I do believe that our commodities are going to have a run here at some point in time. But maybe not quite yet. But it's all just very mysterious. U.S. exports fell in May. We're not really exporting a lot. Largest decline since the pandemic. So at any rate, things just under the surface ball. A lot of people are very uncertain. And of course, I get that a lot from people who are

in business who are like, listen up we have a project going here and I was trying to get contractors, thankfully I have some interested in doing the project, which is a change from the past, maybe there's a sign in that. But I was trying to get them to say can we get to a bid because I would like to have some certainty and they're like, look Chris we just can't. They're like, I don't even know what stuff's gonna cost in 30 days Right and we won't know like it'll be like last week was Western Red Cedar Quadrupled in price in a single week. Did it really I did not catch that Wow. Yeah, just gone

And that's for some local temporary shortfall or something like that, but maybe next week It's Mitsubishi mini splits. You just say, you know, nobody knows. Right. So nobody would commit to that. Well, that level of uncertainty just sort of ripples out across all different, you know, branches of things. So I think everybody's just kind of waiting for some solid ground here to figure out which way to go. But meanwhile, I can tell you that my private conversations, people have never been this worried that there's a shoot about to drop but they can't explain why. No. And that's the...

I'm having more people say nothing makes sense to me. And they'll ask me just in Walmart, they're like, what should I do? And I'm like, well, you're not a client so I don't know your whole financial situation. But I will tell you this, be willing to sacrifice some loss of purchasing power in the short run, maybe 20, 24 months worth of emergency funds, you know, sweep some off the top and prepare yourself for impact to make sure that you can get through 12 to 24 months without being forced to sell something, losing some asset, you know, just be prudent, right? We need to sweep off when things are really, really good and they appear to be too good to be true.

Okay? So if you've got a lot of profits in there, harvest a little bit of those off. You might miss a little bit of opportunity, but know your situation. Do you have to squeeze everything out or you're gonna have to work to your 90? Or are you in a pretty dang good shape and you're ahead of schedule? Sweep a little bit of that off the top. Don't be greedy when everybody else is. What is it Buffett says be? I can't think of the quote. I was hoping you'd remember it. Oh, you know, be fearful. Be fearful when Everybody is greedy and be greedy

when everybody is fearful. And hey, everybody respects Buffett, but nobody wants to do what he did to get where he is. Because it's right here. I know, it took him 50 years, took forever. That's too much time. Yeah. That is true.

Yeah, so we'll just keep our heads on a swivel. And of course, for everybody watching this The last week in July Paul and I will both be out of office as it were For this particular show, so just keep keep there'll be a little gap in there I've got some other interviews lined up that could come in there We're gonna be talking with Aaron Day about the so-called stable coins It's a big giant thing that everybody needs to know about that will have some sort of financial repercussions, but it's early stage,

and I think there's some cautionary pieces in there for everybody to be on the lookout for. Barring that, Paul, any last words here before we close up for the day? Well, I will say this. Make sure you listen to Aaron Day, and even if you're fully convinced that crypto is the answer, to him the guy's brilliant

I could sit and listen to him for hours because he was at your summit last year Is he coming again this year? Yes, he's coming to the side. I can't wait to see him. No, you know, no major words I would just say, you know, if you want a second opinion, you know reach out to us. There's no cause There's no commitment We'll do a retirement stress test, at least so you know where you are, right? And if you're ahead of schedule and you're not sure, am I ahead of schedule?

Can I afford to sweep some off the top and kind of prepare myself and be prudent like you're encouraging me to do? We can demonstrate that for you. So, you know, feel free to reach out, we'd be honored to help you. And hey, if anybody's got any questions about, you know, the cybersecurity, let us know. We'll put you on our mailing list and email list.

So we're updating you when we find new information when it comes off of these scams that are out there. Everybody go to peakfinancialinvesting.com, fill out a simple form if you're interested in talking with Paul or someone from his team. Kicks out an email and within 48 business hours you'll hear back from Kiker Wealth Management to schedule that appointment. So with that, Paul, thanks very much. Have a great weekend.

You as well, Chris. Good to see you again. you