Kyle O’Keefe

Personal Financial Advisor

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

Politicians ruin everything they touch. For my whole life, I knew the outcomes of elections on election eve, or at the latest, in the morning when I woke up. Not anymore. This is ridiculous.

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

iPhones, email and texts are becoming complete annoyances. I think I get 8-10 phone calls everyday from “loan depts”, 20 texts and emails from politicians and lists I never subscribed to. Productivity is declining as bots figure out how to interfere with your life.

[Sean Dekmar @DekmarTrades]

We have all been lied to.

Buy a house and that’s it. You need nothing more in real estate.

My worst investment ever was my Airbnb. It was a headache where I could have 2x my money if I put it in the S&P 500 instead!

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

No matter how much the Administration wants to cut spending. And no matter how much the economy needs a smaller federal government. Congress can’t contain itself. It’s other people’s money, so they spend and spend and spend.

[Thomas Sowell Quotes @ThomasSowell]

Milton Friedman was a brilliant mind.

[Leshka.eth ⛩ @leshka_eth]

billionaire investor Ron Baron told you why you're getting poorer:

money loses 4-5% purchasing power per year
economy grows 2% annually= roughly 7% combined erosion

what this means:
prices double every 10-12 years
your savings cut in half every 15 years
cash under the mattress = guaranteed loss

the system is designed to punish savers

[unusual_whales @unusual_whales]

Reporter: Would a $2,000 dividend check be inflationary?

Bessent: Maybe we can persuade Americans to save that.

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

Intel investment is not a good move. https://t.co/VGTrfGj1yY

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

To follow up on my post about interest rates and inflation…here is a little broader explanation. Bernanke held the federal funds rate at 0% for 7-years…M2 Stable…No Inflation. Powell held the funds rate at 0% for 2-years…M2 surged…Inflation. M2 caused the inflation, not low rates and raising rates does not bring down inflation. It’s all a head fake by the Fed. QE and “abundant reserve” monetary policy have severed the connection between money growth and interest rates. This does not mean that rates should be 0%. They should be about 1.5% above inflation, which today would put the federal funds rate at about 4%, not 4.5%. The Fed should cut by 50 bps immediately. Also, the money supply is now picking up again…growing at a 6.9% annualized rate in the past three months. That is too fast. But the key point is that rates are now set by the Fed itself…whatever it wants to do…whether it makes sense or not. We should have never held rates at 0% for nine years…but the Fed wanted to make it cheaper for the government to issue debt and spend, spend, spend.

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

I hate to pop your narrative bubble…not really…but, interest rates are not the cause or fix of inflation. See below. The US had 7-years of a 0% federal funds rate. No inflation. Then, we had 2-years of 0% and got inflation. It’s not rates, it the M2 money supply.

[Mike Zaccardi, CFA, CMT 🍖 @MikeZaccardi]

Vanguard forecasts US stocks to return 3.9% annually over the next decade.

Large-cap growth: 0.6%

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

CPI beats on overall and “core” in May! The money supply has been flat since 2022…that’s why inflation data has been so subdued. Tariffs don’t cause inflation, excess money printing does.

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

I do not like “easy money”! But I don’t like “too tight money” either. Right now, M2 is below its 2022 peak and the real federal funds rate is near 2%. There is no way the Fed should hold off cutting until December. Tariffs don’t cause inflation.

[jim iuorio @jimiuorio]

We are NOT talking about assembly line jobs people…no one is talking about assembly line jobs..any mind numbing repetitive job was replaced with automation20 years ago…

[Brian Wesbury @wesbury]

For the past 60 years, the US has followed Keynesian policies designed to boost Consumption and reduce Saving. We have also followed a low tariff policy. Other countries have followed a “subsidize to export, high tariff and VAT” policy to reduce their consumption and boost exports. In other words, these countries have sold goods into the US and used our Keynesian redistribution to do it. When the US taxes producers and gives to consumers, consumption of imports goes up. To end this craziness we either need to find a way to massively shrink the size of government, or attack the problem from a different angle. The Trump Tariffs are an option. Yes, they aren’t free market…they aren’t what America has believed in…but they may bring down tariffs around the world, they may force our Congress to stop doing the same thing over and over again. They may just help fix the problems.

[Charlie Bilello @charliebilello]

The $VIX ended the week at 45.3, among the highest weekly closes in history.

What has happened in the past following the highest $VIX levels?

Stocks rallied 100% of the time over the next 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 years with returns far above historical averages.

https://t.co/l5IYmkeySJ

[Stock Market Nerd @StockMarketNerd]

Timely reminder from my favorite investor:

[Brian Baez @MentallyDivine]

THIS. THIS. A MILLION TIMES THIS.

[WallStreetBets @wallstreetbets]

4 years ago today, someone bought this JPEG for $69 million

[zerohedge @zerohedge]

Most. Puts. Ever