💻 Why the Gilded Age Was Golden

The years 1880 to 1900—coined the Gilded Age—was a period of tremendous growth for American industry and technology. Many also criticize it as a time of greed, corruption, and exploitation of the lower and middle classes by the wealthy. Are we living in a second Gilded Age? Renowned historian Amity Shlaes answers this important question.

This video was made possible through a generous donation from the Robert W. Plaster Foundation.

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📈 #LDOUSDT 1 DAY CHART

🔹 LDO made new low after completing its retracement to the supply zone and droppd more than 50%.

🔹Here's the new roadmap for how this coin can move in the next couple of months. We'll update if anything major changes

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⚠️ The debt ceiling of the U.S. government has been high during periods of low interest rates, while conversely, the government's debt has been low during periods of high interest rates. Considering that government debt has now reached its highest level and there is no prospect for a reduction, the only way to ensure debt sustainability is to lower interest rates!

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💦 The Story of Tariffs and Trade Wars Has Happened Before

✏️ Reza Ghanipour

For example, Herbert Hoover, the 31st U.S. president elected in 1928, decided to protect American farmers from European competition using tariffs.

In reality, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act (link) was a return to the 19th-century model of economic stimulus during recessions, particularly from a protectionist perspective. This model was based on the ideas of Henry Clay, who argued that during a recession or crisis, the U.S. should erect a "tariff wall" to shield itself from international market turbulence.

The idea was: "If we impose tariffs, we’ll survive the storm of recession." They tried this after the financial crisis of 1857. There were even attempts in the 1870s and 1890s—but the results were far from impressive, or at best, unclear. When the stock market crashed in 1929, the Great Depression began, and Congress was already reviewing tariffs—

Something they typically did every 5 to 10 years when protectionists were in power. Congress saw the situation as: "This is our chance! Let’s revive Henry Clay’s economic stimulus package. Let’s turn the country into an economic fortress."

But the result was the exact opposite—not just ineffective, but disastrous. It triggered an international trade war. Every other country that was a U.S. trading partner retaliated with tariffs of their own. At the time, America’s main exports were agricultural products—the very sector already in crisis. Now imagine: the U.S. was exporting corn and wheat to Europe, but in response, Europe imposed heavy tariffs.

Which part of the economy was hit first? Agriculture. In reality, this was a double blow to the U.S. economy. In the first four years of the law’s implementation, global trade nearly collapsed, shrinking to less than a quarter of 1920s levels.

Finally, in 1934, Congress admitted: "We messed up. We can’t fix this ourselves," and handed the task over to the State Department for negotiations.

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💻 What's Not to Love about Socialism?

Whoever says socialism doesn’t work must not be looking at Venezuela. Here we see the many benefits of a socialist economy: free healthcare, low greenhouse gas emissions, no illegal immigration, no income inequality, no obesity crisis. Franklin Camargo has some first-hand insights to share.

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💦 The Turtle Trading Experiement: A Successful Market Legend

In 1983, legendary commodity traders Richard Dennis and William Eckhardt held the turtle experiment to prove that anyone could be taught to trade. Using his own money and trading novices, how did the experiment fare?

Key Takeaways

The Turtle Trading experiment was seen as a tremendous success.
Market conditions are always changing, and some question whether this style of trading could survive in today's markets.
Turtle Trading is based on purchasing a stock or contract during a breakout and quickly selling on a retracement or price fall.
The Turtle Trading system is one of the most famous trend-following strategies.

The Turtle Experiment

By the early 1980s, Dennis was widely recognized in the trading world as an overwhelming success. He had turned an initial stake of less than $5,000 into more than $100 million. He and his partner, Eckhardt, had frequent discussions about their success. Dennis believed anyone could be taught to trade the futures markets, while Eckhardt countered that Dennis had a special gift that allowed him to profit from trading.

The experiment was set up by Dennis to finally settle this debate. Dennis would find a group of people to teach his rules to, and then have them trade with real money. Dennis believed so strongly in his ideas that he would actually give the traders his own money to trade. The training would last for two weeks and could be repeated over and over. He called his students "turtles" after recalling turtle farms he had visited in Singapore and deciding that he could grow traders as quickly and efficiently as farm-grown turtles.

➡️ Full text

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🔴 U.S. Enters war with Iran

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🔴I think this scenario can be considered for oil. Could the reason be the ongoing military conflict between Iran and Israel?

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🟠 "Driven by the rise of artificial intelligence and the growth of tech companies, the correlation between the S&P 500 index and other macroeconomic variables in the U.S. has weakened. Since Donald Trump's election victory, the S&P 600 index (representing small-cap companies) has delivered negative returns, which appear to be more aligned with broader economic indicators."

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