Legendary economist Dr. A. Gary Shilling, President of A. Gary Shilling & Co., an economic consulting firm and a registered investment advisor, joins Julia La Roche on episode 301 on FOMC day. In this episode, Dr. Shilling warns that the economy is cooling with weakening labor markets and stagnant job creation, yet security markets continue to rise without reflecting this underlying weakness. Despite the government shutdown limiting official data, private sector information reveals businesses are cautious about demand and inflation, while consumers face limited financial slack due to heavy student loan and credit card borrowing. Shilling believes the Fed is cutting rates because they fear a recession is on the horizon, and he cautions that "we're probably gonna wake up one of these days and find that things are really a lot weaker than we expect" - at which point markets could deteriorate quickly. He also expresses concern about the "debt bomb" - the massive accumulation of government debt now exceeding $38 trillion with no logical endpoint in sight. However, Shilling remains impressed by the adaptability and resilience of the US economy, noting how it has successfully adjusted to disruptions like tariffs that many predicted would be disastrous.

This episode is brought to you by VanEck.

Learn more about the VanEck Rare Earth and Strategic Metals ETF: http://vaneck.com/REMXJulia

This episode is brought to you by Monetary Metals. https://monetary-metals.com/julia

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction & welcome

0:48 - Big picture macro view: economy appears to be cooling

1:30 - Government shutdown: private data filling the holes

2:00 - Weakening labor markets: limited new hiring

2:45 - Businesses cautious about demand and inflation

3:17 - Recession concerns: won't know until well into it

3:45 - Security markets not reflecting economic weakness

4:03 - Fed Chair Powell presser context (October 29th FOMC meeting)

4:32 - Why markets are overly focused on Fed actions

5:30 - Fed's tightrope walk: keeping economy above water

6:25 - Are rate cuts signaling recession fears?

6:34 - Fed concerned about softening labor markets

7:20 - Finding hidden vulnerabilities during data blackout

7:51 - Labor market concerns: limited consumer slack

8:20 - Heavy borrowing: student loans and credit cards

27:24 - US fiscal picture: debt north of $38 trillion

27:45 - The debt bomb concept explained

28:45 - Massive global debt expansion concerns

29:49 - What happens when debt reaches its limit?

30:23 - What's keeping Dr. Shilling up at night

31:15 - Lack of concern about debt accumulation

32:00 - What makes him hopeful: US economy's strength and adaptability

32:46 - Economic adaptability to disruptions

33:11 - Tariffs discussion: six months later perspective

33:46 - How economies adapt to tariff disruptions

35:03 - Where to find Dr. Shilling's work

35:25 - Parting thoughts: avoiding fads of the moment

36:37 - Closing remarks

Access Dr. Shilling's monthly newsletter INSIGHT by calling this toll free number (1-888-346-7444) or visiting his website (https://www.agaryshilling.com/).

Danielle DiMartino Booth, CEO and Chief Strategist at QI Research, joins Julia La Roche to break down the October 2024 FOMC meeting and Fed Chair Powell's surprisingly hawkish stance despite mounting evidence of labor market weakness. Danielle questions whether the Fed is ignoring its dual mandate as major companies like UPS, GM, Meta, and Amazon announce tens of thousands of layoffs. She discusses the unusual dissents from both Stephen Miran and Jeffrey Schmid, explores potential political dynamics at play within the Fed, and examines growing stress in private credit markets, commercial real estate, and rising corporate bankruptcies. Danielle also highlights alternative labor market indicators like state-by-state data and WARN notices that paint a concerning picture of the economy, while emphasizing the importance of compassion for struggling American families heading into the holiday season.

This episode is brought to you by VanEck.

Learn more about the VanEck Rare Earth and Strategic Metals ETF: http://vaneck.com/REMXJulia

This show is brought to you by Monetary Metals.

Learn more about Monetary Metals: https://monetary-metals.com/julia⁠

Links:

Danielle's Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/dimartinobooth

Substack: https://dimartinobooth.substack.com/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DanielleDiMartinoBoothQI

Fed Up: https://www.amazon.com/Fed-Up-Insiders-Federal-Reserve/dp/0735211655

0:00 Introduction & episode 300 celebration

1:37 FOMC meeting reaction - Powell's hawkish tone

2:33 What's really going on at the Fed?

3:48 The two dissenters - Miran & Schmid

5:39 Market reaction to Powell's comments

6:17 The Fed's labor mandate - are they ignoring it?

7:16 Major layoff announcements - UPS, GM, Meta, Amazon

8:00 Is the Fed sticking it to the administration?

9:55 Fed balance sheet & mortgage-backed securities

16:19 Private credit market concerns

27:04 Corporate bankruptcies rising

28:18 October bankruptcy data - highest post-pandemic

29:22 Interest rate impact on corporate refinancing

30:05 What would you ask Powell? State-by-state data

31:29 WARN notices & real labor market data

32:19 Layoffs aren't free - cost to companies

33:10 ADP weekly data as labor market indicator

33:26 Message of compassion during the holidays

34:29 Closing & where to find Danielle's work

35:09 QI Research & Daily Feather newsletter

Michael Pento, president and founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies (PPS), joins Julia La Roche for episode 299. Pento continues to warn of three unprecedented asset bubbles in stocks, bonds, and credit existing concurrently. Despite being net long and up handsomely this year, he emphasizes the critical need for active management. Pento explains why the next crisis will likely stem from spiking bond yields and intractable inflation rather than insolvency alone, making traditional Fed interventions ineffective. He argues that any meaningful correction would be catastrophic given the massive scale of current distortions, while the Fed desperately tries to keep bubbles inflated through rate cuts and resumed quantitative easing.

This episode is brought to you by VanEck.

Learn more about the VanEck Rare Earth and Strategic Metals ETF: http://vaneck.com/REMXJulia

This episode is brought to you by Monetary Metals. Learn more: https://monetary-metals.com/julia⁠

Links:

https://pentoport.com/

https://twitter.com/michaelpento

0:00 Intro and welcome back Michael Pento

0:59 Big picture macro view

1:38 Three unprecedented asset bubbles: Stocks, bonds, and credit

3:38 Inflation accelerating

4:01 Fed panicking to keep the bubble going

6:56 Are you nervous being net long the market?

8:35 The next crisis will be different - Stagflation risk

9:43 Bond market revolt scenario

12:28 Magnificent Seven concentration risk

14:15 Government shutdown and lack of economic data

16:19 Treasury issuance and bond market dynamics

18:42 Federal budget deficit concerns

20:33 Fed's balance sheet and quantitative tightening ending

24:18 Bifurcated economy

36:45 Political pressure on the Fed

38:50 Trump's economic policies and inflation risks

40:33 Tariffs and their inflationary impact

46:23 What keeps Michael up at night?

47:50 The great reconciliation of asset prices coming

49:02 Where to find Michael's work - Pento Portfolio Strategies

50:10 Closing thoughts

Financial commentator Chris Irons, also known as Quoth the Raven on X and author of the popular Fringe Finance substack, warns we're in "completely off the rails, unprecedented territory" with the Fed trapped between printing money to save markets or allowing deflationary debt defaults. He predicts the Fed will ultimately implement yield curve control to bail out the bond market, pushing America down an emerging market path negative for the dollar—which gold's historic rally is already pricing in. Irons dismisses gold meme stock concerns since central banks are the primary buyers, and argues government spending is politically impossible to cut. Drawing from his background as anonymous short seller "Quoth The Raven," he explains why short sellers face unprecedented challenges as Fed liquidity creates massive distortions—$2 trillion in worthless crypto finds bids while fundamentally sound shorts get squeezed. He believes during April's Liberation Day, markets were "days away from a bond market crisis" when stocks and bonds unusually sold off together. Irons warns a sharp deleveraging event is inevitable though timing is uncertain, offering blunt advice: "Don't listen to anybody, including me" and avoid certainty, because we've never been here before and things can change profoundly overnight.

This episode is sponsored by Monetary Metals. Visit https://www.monetary-metals.com/julia/

Links:

X: https://x.com/QTRResearch

Substack: https://quoththeraven.substack.com/

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction & welcome

0:36 - Guest introduction: Chris Irons "Quoth The Raven"

1:14 - Big picture macro view: unprecedented territory

2:19 - Gold's rally & stock market highs

2:54 - The 100-year inflationary cycle

4:35 - Fed's dual mandate tension

5:34 - Upcoming Fed meeting & rate cuts

8:00 - Young generation following monetary policy

10:00 - Gold

16:00 - The debasement trade going mainstream

18:40 - Fiscal picture

23:00 - Gold, feels we are on the precipice of a big change

28:00 - Short selling

43:00 - The ultimate bubble

45:00 - Closing

Jim Bianco, president of Bianco Research, returns to The Julia La Roche Show for episode 297 for an in-studio appearance. Bianco argues the Fed is making a policy error by cutting rates when financial markets are at all-time highs across the board—stocks, gold, bonds, M2, and home prices. He explains that job creation has slowed from 158,000 to 29,000 per month not because the economy is weak, but because immigration has essentially stopped, reducing population growth to an 80-year low—meaning 29,000 jobs may actually be appropriate. Bianco warns that cutting rates in this environment risks recreating inflation through two key channels: tariffs (average rates up 6x to 17-18%) and remote work (giving labor more power to demand higher wages). He sees dangerous concentration in AI stocks (41 companies representing 47% of S&P 500 market cap) reminiscent of late-1990s bubble dynamics, with aggressive retail buying and passive flows creating mispricing that could end badly when the "buy the dip" mentality finally breaks.

This episode is sponsored by Monetary Metals. Visit monetary-metals.com/julia

Links:

BiancoResearch.com

BiancoAdvisors.com

x.com/biancoresearch

0:00 Welcome Jim Bianco - first in-person episode

0:27 Big picture macro view

1:18 Jobs market slowdown - 158K to 29K jobs/month

2:18 Immigration and population growth collapse

3:04 How many jobs should we be creating?

4:34 Is the Fed making a policy error by cutting?

6:35 Risk of recreating inflation with rate cuts

7:28 Tariffs update - average rate up 6x to 17-18%

9:00 Remote work as inflation driver

10:32 Labor power shift and wage pressure

13:00 Where will new workers come from?

15:00 What would you ask Jay Powell at FOMC?

17:05 What problem does cutting rates actually fix?

18:15 Market behavior - everything going up

19:08 The 60/40 portfolio debate

20:00 Passive bid and perpetual motion machine

21:25 Retail buying the dip aggressively

23:02 AI concentration - 41 companies = 47% of market cap

25:00 Data center overbuilding risk

25:59 Opening your statements - everything looks great

27:28 Top 10% making 50% of all income

29:21 Inflation destroys cultures and economies

30:00 Would you trade higher unemployment for lower inflation?

33:17 Inflating our way out of debt problem

34:19 Jay Powell's "do your patriotic duty" speeches in 2022

36:23 Story of interviewing for Fed Governor position

39:11 Judy Shelton coming up one vote short

41:28 Who will be next Fed Chair?

42:51 Why Kevin Hassett is the leading choice

45:30 Where to find Jim's work and the WTBN ETF

Macro trends blogger and economist David Woo @DavidWooUnbound, CEO of David Woo Unbound, a global forum devoted to the promotion of fact-based debates about markets, politics, and economics, joins Julia La Roche on episode 296 to discuss the trade war, AI, and markets.

Sponsors:

Monetary Metals. https://monetary-metals.com/julia

In this episode, Woo warns that the US economy is heading toward stagflation as tariff impacts finally materialize, with holiday shopping expected to be weak due to consumers having front-loaded purchases in anticipation of price increases. He argues the US is now in a weaker position versus China in the tech war, as China has survived Trump's tariffs through factory automation and AI integration while US manufacturing continues shedding jobs even in protected sectors. Woo is short NASDAQ heading into November 1st, when China's rare earth export restrictions take effect, believing the market has mispriced both the AI bubble (with companies like OpenAI spending unsustainably while hitting technology plateaus) and the intensifying US-China showdown over AI supremacy—calling this "the macro trade of our generation."

Woo, the former head of Global Interest Rates, Foreign Exchange, Emerging Markets Fixed Income Strategy & Economics Research at Bank of America, is known for some of his bold and contrarian calls, including Trump winning the presidential race in 2016 (https://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/08/bofaml-analyst-got-ovation-from-co-workers-the-morning-after-election.html), and that the 2020 US presidential election would be much closer than expected and the results contested (https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/the-dangerous-groupthink-stalking-wall-street-20210909-p58q48).

Links:

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DavidWooUnbound

Website: https://www.davidwoounbound.com/

Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/Davidwoounbound

Timestamps:

0:00 Welcome David Woo back to the show

0:54 Big picture macro view and difficult 2025

3:08 Why tariffs haven't impacted economy yet

6:09 Consumer spending as preemptive buying

9:16 Holiday shopping weakness ahead

10:05 Gen Z consumer struggles

12:05 Stagflation thesis explained

14:28 Manufacturing job losses in protected sectors

16:43 Who's benefiting from tariffs?

18:05 US-China trade war positioning

21:52 China's factory automation advantage

23:54 US vs China AI strategies

26:44 The race for AI dominance

29:31 The macro trade of our generation

32:01 Jensen Huang: China "nanosecond behind"

34:22 September 29th export sanctions expansion

35:51 November 1st deadline explained

36:27 What would you tell Trump administration?

38:37 Shorting NASDAQ and AI bubble thesis

40:01 OpenAI's revenue vs spending problem

43:44 Technology plateau concerns

46:09 AI bubble meets US-China tensions

47:06 Risk management for short positions

49:15 Key catalysts: November 1st & earnings guidance

52:31 What keeps David up at night

53:13 Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine concern

55:03 Final thoughts and where to find David

Lawrence Lepard explains how the "monetary debasement trade" has gone mainstream as gold hit $4,200 and silver broke to $52. He presents a chart showing Bitcoin lags gold by months before moving harder, predicting Bitcoin will hit $250K as signs point to the "imminent big print" with Powell's May 2026 term ending.

Sponsor: Monetary Metals. https://monetary-metals.com/julia

Links:

X: https://x.com/LawrenceLepard

Website: https://ema2.com/

The Big Print book: https://www.amazon.com/Big-Print-Happened-America-Sound/dp/B0DVTCWYNN

0:00 Welcome back Lawrence Lepard

1:09 Monetary debasement trade going mainstream

2:07 Gold broke from $3,400 to $4,200, silver new all-time high at $52

3:58 Fed

5:08 Fed balance sheet signs pointing to imminent big print

7:38 Bitcoin has lag to gold - gold smells it first, Bitcoin moves harder

9:38 US stock market $66T vs gold/silver miners $800B market cap

11:04 Silver move signals real bull market - heading to $60-$100

13:22 Big beautiful bill spending away tariff and DOGE savings

15:14 Chart: Bitcoin lags gold but moves harder when it catches up

18:09 Gold/Bitcoin both sound money - shouldn't fight each other

20:16 Everything bubble - been dead wrong shorting stocks

22:38 This decade like 1970s on steroids with stagflation

24:51 Possible currency reset or hyperinflation tail case

27:03 Base case: stagflationary 1970s on steroids

28:42 12 Fed members set price of money for 330 million Americans

31:13 Real Housewives of Wall Street - wife borrowed $200M non-recourse

34:17 HBS confronting Geithner - victory lap for corrupt 2008 bailouts

36:07 Changed shorting rules during crisis - got wiped out

41:22 Daniel Webster: inflation fertilizes rich man's field with poor man's sweat

42:50 WWI Liberty bonds first modern big print doubled prices

46:01 Next 10 years vision: Blue team 2028, hyperinflation by 2032

47:54 Michael Saylor for president 2032 - modern Thomas Jefferson

48:28 Why Bitcoin not gold? Better, digital age, hard to move gold

50:37 Bitcoin inequality concern - rich will spend it, plumbers get paid in it

52:59 Sound money means no more wars - governments can't afford them

54:12 Fix debt? It's in worthless dollars - we're out of debt

56:52 Decentralization saving us now

Thomas Thornton, founder and president of Hedge Fund Telemetry, returns to The Julia La Roche Show to discuss extreme market conditions with investors "all in, levered, and complacent." He argues we're at a blow-off top characterized by record call buying, leverage through ETFs, and a gambling mentality fueled by 0DTE options and sports betting culture.

Thornton highlights dangerous market mechanics: the Goldman Sachs most shorted basket is up 38% year-to-date, meaning short sellers have been squeezed out and won't provide natural buying support during corrections. He notes extreme concentration risk with 10 stocks comprising 40% of the S&P 500, and Nvidia alone responsible for 18% of market gains. Technical indicators show exhaustion signals while the market continues higher on narrowing breadth. Thornton identifies AI trade risks including slowing CapEx growth, insufficient power infrastructure, and water constraints for data centers. He rebuts bull arguments by comparing current conditions unfavorably to 2000, noting $38 trillion in debt versus $4 trillion then. He explains why the Fed can't save markets this time due to Treasury market dysfunction. Currently positioned net short with disciplined risk management, Thornton predicts people will look back on 2025 and say "the signs were so obvious." He advises investors to lower exposures and leverage, warning that opportunities will come when his indicators reach oversold levels and nobody wants to buy.

This episode is brought to you by Monetary Metals. https://monetary-metals.com/julia

Links:

https://www.hedgefundtelemetry.com/

https://www.x.com/tommythornton

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction and welcome

1:02 - "People are all in, levered, and complacent" - Market positioning

3:43 - Gambling mentality and comparison to past market cycles

5:20 - How leverage and zero DTE options change market dynamics

7:39 - "Market correction or something worse" - What's ahead

7:52 - "I definitely think we're at a blow off top"

9:20 - Goldman Sachs most shorted basket and dangerous market mechanics

11:51 - Passive ETFs and leverage risk

12:46 - Market sentiment analysis with charts

14:13 - CNN Fear & Greed Index critique

15:30 - DeMark indicators flashing exhaustion signals

18:22 - Goldman Sachs most shorted basket technical breakdown

19:01 - Concentration risk: 10 stocks = 40% of S&P 500

21:28 - Call buying extremes and put/call ratios

23:23 - AI trade risks and CapEx spending concerns

25:42 - Energy and water constraints for AI data centers

30:28 - Market narrowing despite new highs

32:40 - Bull case rebuttal: Why this is different from 2000

34:48 - Why the Fed can't save the market this time

36:22 - Net short positioning and risk management strategy

39:44 - "The signs were so obvious" - How we'll remember 2025

41:35 - Long idea: Golar natural gas infrastructure play

44:28 - Hedge Fund Telemetry overview and parting advice