The dollar’s on the ropes, but the perma-bulls will always hope and cope. Nothing in the data – which is provided by the same government that promulgates print-and-spend policy – is positive for the U.S. dollar. Yet, the spin doctors are relentless even if their arguments have more holes than Swiss cheese.

Sometimes, stock traders catch a rocket ship and ride into outer space. They trumpet these success stories on social media, making it seem like they’re just hitting one home run after another. Of course, they’re omitting the failures that wiped out their trading accounts.

In 2022, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell assured us that inflation was “transitory.” Then, he turned tail and decided it wasn’t actually transitory. Now, Powell wants us to believe that the Fed can thread the proverbial needle by getting inflation down without a large increase in unemployment.

History shows that no currency is meant to dominate forever. The almighty U.S. dollar is no exception, and recent signs point to a movement – not only in China but from multiple world powers – to dethrone the dollar as the reserve currency of the world.

The NASDAQ just booked its eighth positive week in a row, while the S&P 500 is up five consecutive weeks and counting. Both indexes are at their highest levels since April of 2022, which is well over a year ago. How can sensible investors make sense of this relentless rally?

I hate, hate, hate when they do this. The mainstream press spouts out enormous-font headlines like, “Inflation rose at a 4% annual rate in May, the lowest in 2 years.” Then they bury the dirty details that expose the widening wealth gap and the nation’s economic woes.

Patience pays, but waiting can be costly. Two of the summer’s most impactful events are coming up this week, and chasing commodity prices after the fact won’t be nearly as profitable as anticipating the trends before they happen.

In the financial markets as in life, there are striking divergences between the haves and the have-nots. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer – and similarly, the large-caps get larger while the small-caps get smaller.

History repeats itself if we don’t learn from it. Patriots know that America is the greatest country in the world, but greatness must be maintained. It will require more than hope and prayers to prevent this great country from repeating the famous collapse of another dominant nation-state.

It might be an exaggeration to call the Federal Reserve sadistic – or it might not be, as the central bank wants to see it get harder, not easier, to get a job in the U.S. The probability of an imminent interest rate hike just grew as a key job openings gauge pointed to a resilient labor market.

Even if you’ve seen it a thousand times before, it’s still amazing to witness the market’s rapid changes in sentiment. In a matter of days, investors have flipped from fearfully risk-off to stunningly risk-on, leaving safety hedges like gold behind in favor of “momo” plays, especially in large-cap technology stocks.