| By Bill Bonner, Chairman, Bonner & Partners Don’t they know; it’s the end of the world – Skeeter Davis RANCHO SANTANA, NICARAGUA – Wow… What a week. Each hour the stock market was open last week cost investors $97 billion. By the end of the week the Dow was down 12%. It was its worst week since 2008. The Wall Street Journal: When the S&P 500 closed at a record on Feb. 19, American stocks seemed untouched by the anxiety around the coronavirus epidemic that had already rattled investors in other markets, including bonds, commodities and some foreign shares. Nine days later, an unnerving reality has set in. The S&P 500 has just suffered its fastest-ever 10% decline from an all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is headed for its worst week since the start of the 2008 global financial crisis. By Thursday, it was clear that the feds were going to react. Federal Reserve governor James Bullard was the first to take the stage. “Further policy rate cuts are a possibility…” he led off. On his tail the next day, Fed chief Jerome Powell told investors that the Fed would “act as appropriate.” What is the appropriate action for a central bank in the event of a pandemic? That is not a question that Powell, Bullard, Trump et al. are going to ask. Because there is only one thing they can do… and it’s completely inappropriate. That’s the charm of the feds… There is no calamity – natural or manmade – that they can’t make worse. All they have to work with is fake money. They either add it. Or take it away. Guess which one they are planning to do now? | Recommended Link | | Prepare for Takeoff! Prepare for takeoff! On Wednesday, March 18, YOU get to fly private with Teeka Tiwari, the most trusted person in cryptocurrency. Your destination: the hidden epicenter of a millionaire-making phenomenon coming to crypto in 2020. 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But for the first 200,000 years or so, modern plagues couldn’t get much of a purchase. People were too dispersed. Then, with the arrival of agriculture, animal husbandry, large, settled communities, and widespread trade, the little creeps saw their opportunity… Useless Remedies Roman historian Procopius tells us that in the Plague of Justinian, as many as 10,000 people died every day. Victims tried cold water baths and powders blessed by saints. But nothing worked. Emperor Justinian himself got the fever, but recovered. And while survivors were soon back on their feet, the Byzantine Empire never fully recovered. Dead men pay no taxes, nor do they serve as soldiers or administrators. [Amazing 17-second Video Reveals Key to Tech Fortune…] The Black Death struck Europe in 1347, killing as many as 30 million. This time, people showed more imagination. Many believed the scourge was a punishment for sin. To atone, they joined mobs of self-tormentors, as many as a thousand in a bunch, roaming from town to town (spreading the plague!). These Flagellants dragged heavy crosses and whipped each other as they went along. Again, the remedies were useless. And in addition to killing half the population, the plague caused an economic collapse. Laborers, farmers, craftsmen – there were few left to do the work. And those few, healthy though they may have been, must have felt the cold finger of death tapping them on the shoulder. They saw no point in working. Fields, shops, markets, canals, roads, city walls, houses, barns, whole towns – all were abandoned or neglected. | Recommended Link | | America’s #1 investor issues *Major Buy Alert* Since 2016, Teeka Tiwari has trumped the stock market. His investment recommendations have averaged 154% per year. That’s 10 times the S&P. And 81 times the average investor, according to JP Morgan! However, one investment Teeka just uncovered could top them all… It involves President Trump, billions of dollars, several large banks, as well as Warren Buffett. As well as a MAJOR upgrade to our credit and debit cards. Teeka, who correctly picked the last two “investments of the decade,” is declaring this his top pick for the 2020s. | | | -- | Appealing Scapegoats But while the Flagellants blamed themselves, others found more appealing scapegoats. Jews were targeted, especially in the Rhineland. There, whole communities of them, in Mainz and Frankfurt-am-Main, were annihilated. (It’s no coincidence: Jews were the moneylenders of the era. By killing Jews, people were also able to reduce their debts.) With much of the working population wiped out, the surviving peasants found themselves in a good bargaining position. Wages were doubled… even tripled. [New 5G Device Revealed to Public for First Time] Naturally, the feds interceded. King Edward III tried to force wages back to 1346 levels, but with little success. Later on, the Great Plague of London in the 17th century was comparatively mild, claiming only about 100,000 victims. The rich fled the city to the relative safety of their country houses. This proved somewhat effective. Most of those who died were the poor who were left in the city. Back in London, people lit bonfires to clean the air and prayed to the saints to spare them. Cats and dogs were killed… in the belief that they carried the disease. (This probably made things worse since they no longer controlled the rats, which were the real carriers.) Finally, the end of the plague was marked by another catastrophe, the Great Fire in 1666. The pestilence had wiped out the poor, and the fire wiped out the rich. London had to be rebuilt – its population and its wealth – almost from scratch. | Recommended Link | | 5G is still in its infancy. Invest now Lately, it seems that everyone is talking about 5G technology… But, does anyone really know what it is? 5G will provide users more coverage at a faster rate, especially for power-hungry streaming content like 4k video and VR… Yet 5G is still in its infancy. If you don’t know which companies stand to benefit – like Silicon Valley executive and angel investor Jeff Brown does — then you’re going to get left behind. Three years ago, Jeff predicted Nvidia would be the number one tech stock of that year. Investors had a chance to make 10 times their money on Nvidia. Now he’s singled out one company that makes the device to power the 5G revolution… Taking this breakthrough technology from $0 to $100 billion in a matter of months. | | | -- | Archangels of the Fed Today, we live in a modern era… enlightened by science and daytime talk shows. In times of crisis, we turn to the archangels Alan, Ben, Janet, and Jerome. “Touch us… heal us,” we pray. Every house in America has a photo of the 12 disciples of the Federal Open Market Committee on its wall. And we make the sign of the dollar every time we pass by. But in all of these historical accounts of pestilence, plague, and bug attacks, no mention is made of central bankers – either in curing the disease or remediating the economic damage. The reason for that is simple: There is nothing they can do. Fake money can distort prices – either asset or consumer prices. But fake money can’t replace workers… or sales… or profits. Not even real money can do that. And while the C virus is nothing like the Black Death, it has a similar economic effect: The capital is still there – the buildings, the stocks, the factories, the savings, roads, and resources. But the income has disappeared. In Wuhan, the steel factories are cold and quiet. Schools in Japan and Italy no longer echo with happy cries when the bell rings. Airplane pilots have been grounded. Restaurant owners eye their empty tables, awaiting diners who never show up. And spiders build their webs at the entrance to cruise ships, confident they will not be disturbed. Those sales… income… and profits don’t show up on company reports, on wage statements, or in GDP. And like virginity, they can never be recovered. Stay tuned… Regards, Bill Like what you’re reading? Send your thoughts to feedback@bonnerandpartners.com. FEATURED READS How the Coronavirus Is Impacting Global Fiscal Policy
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In his Postcards From the Fringe e-letter, colleague Tom Dyson has been warning about an upcoming recession. But if you follow his suggestions, you could come out the other side with your wealth still intact… MAILBAG Mixed opinions from Dear Readers about the coronavirus… Bill’s thoughts only begin to cover what panic really looks like. Americans are so complacent and unaware of the wider world’s long-standing problems, believing they are immune from hardship and loss because our country is invincible and preeminent among all nations. We may soon be shaken out of our self-satisfied ways with a virus that knows nothing about military might or deficit spending to prop up a very unstable economic system. There will be little politicians of any ideology can potentially do to stop the panic. Food, cash availability, services, and employment could all be irreparably impacted. – FG V. Bill is right. COVID-19 is way overblown. It’s nothing but a new version of the common cold. But the weak, mewling, fearful population of the modern world is running around like a bunch of Chicken Littles, wearing masks, and "self-quarantining" because the big, bad coronavirus is coming for them! Give me a break! If the virus mutates into something really dangerous, we’ll know it. I won’t get excited unless the death toll gets up into the tens-of-millions. THEN, we’d have a problem on our hands. – Dale A. While another Dear Reader echoes Bill’s critiques of the military-industrial complex in “Lions Led by Jackasses”… I was drafted for the Korean War during the so-called "police action." Fortunately for me, I was not sent to the hell hole that we created on that peninsula. Many of my friends were, and thankfully most came back home still in one piece. Almost no one in this country has even the slightest clue about how the United States used the puppet regime that we set up in Korea to get the war started. Even fewer understand how our attempt at the end of World War Two to expand our empire put our troops in Korea, where we had no business being. The false pretext was that Korea was part of Japan’s empire, and as such, was subject to our military occupation as part of Japan. Nothing could be further from the truth. Bill Bonner is trying to warn those still capable of understanding (unfortunately very few now) that our situation is not what the elites would have us believe it is. When reality comes to visit, we will very soon experience the depredations that we have inflicted, via the criminal cabal we call our leaders, upon countless millions throughout the world. – Richard O. Are coronavirus fears as overblown as Dale believes? Are Americans as complacent and unaware of reality as FG thinks? Write us at feedback@bonnerandpartners.com. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT… A Political “Pandora’s Box” Is About to Be Opened Have you heard of House bill HR 2990? What about the Senate’s SR 759 bill? Click here to read this alarming development. 
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