“Mother Of All Bubbles” Keeps Gold In Focus

Today I want to discuss reports that global debt levels are at all-time highs, and what this means for your investment decisions going forward.

But first, a few comments about last week. I recently returned from the Oxford Club’s Private Wealth Seminar, held at the historic Grand Hotel on Michigan’s Mackinac Island. The hotel, which some of you might remember as the setting for the 1980 film “Somewhere in Time,” starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour, took a mere 93 days to build in the 1880s—impossible by today’s standards, especially when you consider that it boasts the world’s largest front porch at 660 feet.

While there, I had the privilege of catching up with some old friends and contacts, including Alex Green, the Oxford Club’s chief investment strategist. You might have read some of his wonderful work for Investment U, the group’s educational arm.

Alex reminded me over lunch that the difference between Democrats and Republicans, in his view, is that Democrats are for personal freedom and some economic restrictions, while Republicans are for economic freedom and some personal restrictions.

I prefer to focus on policies instead of partisan politics, but Alex has a point. I’m convinced that Donald Trump, a Republican, won the presidential election because of his pledge to reform the tax code and deregulate resonated with both white-collar and blue-collar Americans who felt as if the U.S. economy was no longer working for them. U.S. corporate taxes are among the highest in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), spurring large multinationals to move operations overseas, and out-of-control regulations threaten to strangle business growth.

But just as Green insinuated, the Trump administration has enacted or has hinted at enacting, policies that rankle Americans of all political stripes, precisely because they could be used to encroach upon personal liberties.

Take Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ recent decision to strengthen the government’s ability to seize private property from suspected criminals. (The operative word here is “suspected.”) Many now are arguing this directive could be abused by police and other officials. It could, in fact, violate the Fourth Amendment, which of course protects Americans against “unreasonable searches and seizures.”