Doomstead

A crash will happen.  Is this tremor a prelude to an earthquake?





Are billionaires approaching peak prosperity?

As things progress, honesty about America's financial condition will be hard to find.

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 04, 2026, 03:11 PMAs things progress, honesty about America's financial condition will be hard to find.[/color]

Well, for as many decades, centuries and millennium Apocalyptians have been around, I can only venture....what took so long to get to the point of....MAYBE this time?
,
Psst....are there that many of us left to even notice? 🧐

Blackstone's private credit fund is capping investor withdrawals at half the demand

This is essentially the same as Banks closing their doors and not allowing withdrawals at the beginning of the Great Depression.  They are experiencing a Bank Run and are trying to slow it down.  Probleem is, that action actually created more panic.

(https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/02/LSE_2022_banking-panic_luck_460.jpg)

Hedge Funds like Blackstone are the Banks of the rich class today, and they are beginning to PANIC.  Blackstone is one of the biggest, which will influence the investors in smaller funds.  If a full blown run on the private credit market gets underway, it inevitably will cause a financial crisis, particularly since the Bond Market is so unstable right now.  There's no safe haven for people trying to liquidate their investments.

Remember, as I said in a prior post, the only thing backing the Dollar is the "Full Faith & Credit of the FSoA".  A run on HFs is a critical sign that the rich have lost faith in the credit worthiness of the FSoA.  It's remarkable to me that it has taken this long, mainly because the monopoly on money creation is so comprehensive there's no alternative in the trade clearing biz besides the relatively new BRICS system.  Utilizing it would require exchanging Dollars for a BRICS currency, mainly Renminby.  That happening at any scale would be WWIII.

RE

Considering rising crude oil prices, inflation risks, excessive stock valuations, and expectations for future interest-rate policy. The most likely outcome for next week is a modest market pullback.  Decline or pause after recent gains in the last couple of months.  A rally is less probable and would depend on new optimistic Trump manure appearing in the mainstream press.


Not to be doom an gloom, the odds of a lackluster rally is not one in seven thousand.  It is only one in five. 

(https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6047d405b02148755fb6e601/fb3b8efc-f5db-4276-97ce-316f05f789c3/image_2025-03-17_213358799.png?format=2500w) 

Being that the probability of Trump bullshit is so high, the rally still has a 20% probability.




The Oracle of Delphi has issued her forecast for next week.

Fools and their money will soon be parted.

Building your pre-crash emergency fund is getting harder by the day.

His rocket company is targeting a valuation of $1.77 trillion, which would make it one of the 10 biggest companies in the world—bigger than Meta, Walmart, and, for that matter, Tesla.

As if there aren't enough things out there insuring the coming implosion of global finance will be earth  shattering, Elon Musk is contributing his gigantic SpaceX turd into the mix, and Chump intends to use taxpayer money to buy an equity stake in this shitpile.  The kiss of death.

RE

A company that is losing money is not worth $1.77 trillion.  Correct me if I am wrong.

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 07, 2026, 09:22 PMA company that is losing money is not worth $1.77 trillion.  Correct me if I am wrong.

If you BELIEVE Elon, you're wrong.  He writes a Biz Plan that PROJECTS future revenues that will pay investors a fat dividend every year if they give him their money to make the capital expenditure necessary to put his data centers up in space where they will get free solar energy to run.  This is the magic of using Other People's Money to get filthy rich.  Elon is a Master Salesman, and is able to convince the Smartest People in the Room he can do this.

Most biznesses have to produce something tangible and need lots of people to run.  The AI biz needs neither.  Once he has the hardware up in space, it needs no people to run.  Nothing tangible has to be shipped, it just processes data.  He can run the biz out of one office building anywhere in the world.  Virtually all of the money paid each day to process data on his machines in orbit is pure profit.

In REALITY, will people pay enough money every year to make those profits?  I highly doubr it.  He doesn't need to convince me though, he just needs to convince the bank that underwrites the IPO.  Then the brokers convince their clients to buy the stock.  POOF, Elon is a trillionaire!  No hard work necessary, no unique brilliant invention, just salesmanship.  It's his gift.

The truth is this is likely the final blowoff phase before the big bust.  At least it guaratees the crash will be spectacular.

RE

Where is the cooling water in space?  How will the chips be cooled in space.

I realize this is a stupid question as Spaxe-X will reduce the cost of sending hardware into space to zero.

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 08, 2026, 07:33 AMWhere is the cooling water in space?  How will the chips be cooled in space.

I realize this is a stupid question as Spaxe-X will reduce the cost of sending hardware into space to zero.

As long as you are in the shade, the temperature is close to absolute zero.  No atmosphere to circulate the heat.  The computers can be shaded by the solar panels and you can use a closed loop cooling system.

RE

If I was a lying asshole I could work for Trump.

The "Hiding Victims" Problem: Averages ignore the variance of outcomes. If 4% of stocks generate all the returns, that means 96% of stocks are essentially "losers" or break-evens.

For an individual retiree, the probability of holding that 4% vs. the 96% is a massive gamble, not a guaranteed "10% return as the author claims.

There are people who have had secure financial positions ruined in time stretches that averages ignore.  A retiree drawing down funds in the late 1970s (a period of stagflation) had a vastly different experience than someone retiring in 2010.

New York Times propaganda.

Quote from: RE on Jun 08, 2026, 03:48 AMNo hard work necessary, no unique brilliant invention, just salesmanship.  It's his gift.

RE

Having the ability to disrupt major markets, like auto manufacturing, aerospace, etc etc, doesn't require unique brilliant inventions or hard work maybe. Right place, right time, right idea, it is America. Being born with brains delivers all sorts of outcomes....sometimes including none. Or trillionairehood.

As RE said

Quoteit is America.

The database is restored up to the last backup which was yesterday.  Merging in the posts that were made today is too much damn work.

No the men in black did not cause the problem except that they are certainly behind the trolls who pretend to be Russian.  I am dealing with them, and that caused me to use untested code which wiped the trolls and everyone else out except for RE and I.  Since we are admins the code did not delete us.

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 19, 2026, 05:28 PMNo the men in black did not cause the problem except that they are certainly behind the trolls who pretend to be Russian.

Really? Is the idea that the MIB pretend to be Russian trolls because..they are more believable than when they pretend to be North Korean or Chinese ones?

Quote from: TDoS on Jun 19, 2026, 07:50 PM

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 19, 2026, 05:28 PMNo the men in black did not cause the problem except that they are certainly behind the trolls who pretend to be Russian.

Really? Is the idea that the MIB pretend to be Russian trolls because..they are more believable than when they pretend to be North Korean or Chinese ones?

The point is that the trolls are almost certainly government action.  Why else would anyone plant registrations to see the internals of this site without being a member and making a post like a goddamn human would.  And if anyone else was doing it, the government would be all over them in spades.  Think about it.  This is not the only asshole the government wants to climb up.  The only time they would not be investigating other investigators is when they are doing their surveillance through a third party, which they always do. They are not going to watch themselves.

The point of being Russian or any other nationality is to be untraceable.  I doubt this website is even visible in Russia.  Or North Korea, or China.  One of the Russian passages was a guide on how to rent a car in Turkey.  This is nothing new.  Untraceable bullshit.  The same technique has been used for years.

Untraceable surveillance is the game, and because this forum can set user permissions, being a member is necessary to know what is going on inside here.

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 19, 2026, 08:40 PM

Quote from: TDoS on Jun 19, 2026, 07:50 PM

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 19, 2026, 05:28 PMNo the men in black did not cause the problem except that they are certainly behind the trolls who pretend to be Russian.

Really? Is the idea that the MIB pretend to be Russian trolls because..they are more believable than when they pretend to be North Korean or Chinese ones?

The point is that the trolls are almost certainly government action.  Why else would anyone plant registrations to see the internals of this site without being a member and making a post like a goddamn human would.

Easy answer. Because they are spammers. They write script, the same as you. Those scripts run around, sign up to sites (you should see the same things popping up on peakoil.com, effectively an even more dead website than this one), and then amusingly post in a language that certainly isn't English. I didn't say they were smart spammers. Any person would know better than to post Chinese or Russian on a mostly Anglo-file site like that, or here, but because everything is automated, they just don't care what their individual misses are, only that they have some hits.

This behavior strikes me as typical, as opposed to the government thinking there is any way whatsoever randomly spamming sites with less than a handful of users.

Quote from: K-DogAnd if anyone else was doing it, the government would be all over them in spades.  Think about it.

I did. See more logical explanation above. If it were American secret services they would actually look American. They would speak American. They would ask about if we had any bomb making secrets, etc etc. It would be some FBI intern tasked with opening 50 usernames on the 50 most subversive sites trolling for targets to arrest, not interested in politically irritated older folks who are mobile, strike one user, have nothing to lose, strike two other users, and presto there is no one left of interest.

Quote from: K-DogThis is not the only asshole the government wants to climb up.

Or not one the government wants to climb up at all. You, me and RE are all capable of working out a threat analysis of the entirety of this website and coming to about the same analytical conclusion. There is none.

Quote from: K-DogThe only time they would not be investigating other investigators is when they are doing their surveillance through a third party, which they always do. They are not going to watch themselves.

The point of being Russian or any other nationality is to be untraceable.  I doubt this website is even visible in Russia.  Or North Korea, or China.  One of the Russian passages was a guide on how to rent a car in Turkey.  This is nothing new.  Untraceable bullshit.  The same technique has been used for years.

Probably because.....spammers don't learn for shit.

Quote from: K-DogUntraceable surveillance is the game, and because this forum can set user permissions, being a member is necessary to know what is going on inside here.

Or random spamming is the game. I'm certain the FBI could be untraceable, and doesn't have to pretend to be spammers as a way in. Just do I what I do. Sign up. Show up. Say something. And then ask cute questions about if the 3 of us know any subversives. Or encourage us to become subversives. So K-Dog....but by "subversive" I don't mean the politically irritated. I'm guessing folks what I just described, which is exactly how US services seem to catch all kinds of half wits just saying stupid shit online and then arresting them the instant someone takes the bait and buys some primer cord off of them in a grocery parking lot, is a well defined MO.And doesn't involve spamming a site with Eastern European languages. Or Chinese. 

We are obviously not going to agree about this, and I am not going to argue about it.  But I have one question for you.  Why would a spammer spam us?  There is no financial gain at all.  Why would a spammer want to be here.

You live in the reality most Americans live in.  Ignorant.  Blissfully ignorant.  You have never been gang-stalked and I have.  Were that ever to happen to you, then you would be in a unique position to see how things work.  You, might actually wonder where all the billions in government dark money actually goes.  And once seeing how things are done, you might be less inclined to spout off about shit you know nothing about when it happens again.

It really is a perfect system, people like you are incapable of seeing what you don't want to see.  Personally I want the truth no matter how painful it is.

You call them 'spammers' as if that's a known, settled category, but you've never actually interacted with a single spammer in your life. You don't know who they are, what they want, or why they do what they do. You're just applying a label you soaked up like a sponge to dismiss something you don't understand.

What part of 'untraceable surveillance' did you not understand?

* It is interesting how many people who have never had their own website can be so adamant in their belief that the American government would not do such a thing.  Surveil their own citizens without a warrant, heaven forbid.  It would never happen you say.

** In June 2013, Edward Snowden began disclosing classified documents which revealed, the existence of global surveillance programs by the U.S. government, and it's capabilities in cyberspace. 

Do you want to say it never happened?

Quote from: K-Dog on Jun 20, 2026, 06:58 AMWe are obviously not going to agree about this, and I am not going to argue about it.  But I have one question for you.  Why would a spammer spam us?  There is no financial gain at all.  Why would a spammer want to be here.

We certainly might not agree on everything....there is no such requirement in the real world. My answer is your logic is faulty. You pose "why", and then argue no underlying financial motive. You forget....spammers are a bulk logic argument, there is no requirement of targeeting.

Quote from: K-DogYou live in the reality most Americans live in.  Ignorant.  Blissfully ignorant.

Well, I will agree that there are things I am ignorant of. But neither am I "most Americans". You and I have a net worth that guarentees that. And certainly I am not ignorant, let alone blissfully. We certainly might have different experiences on the way to where we got where we are, and none of mine run to "ignorant", blissfully or otherwise.

You are naturally conspiratorial. A perspective not unjustied by your claimed experience. From a clinical perspective, but one I've observed starting with peak oilers early this century. This particular characteristic exists as a common thread, and far beyond just peak oil. Folks didn't arrive at peak oil because PhDs were claiming it, but because Ruppert told them the government was covering it up, and 9/11 was part of it.

And then the internet arrived, and poured gasoline on every nutter idea in the known universe. Now anyone could prove anything they wanted, claim anything they wanted, social groups formed of folks who believed the same concept (like peak oil forums) but not JUST a concept, but the entire underlying imagined causes. A conspiracy. Conspiracy works...why? Because they exist. And are surely easier to suppose than when someone tries to tangle with my technical expertise.

Quote from: K-DogYou have never been gang-stalked and I have.

Depends on how we define gang stalking. My life was turned upside down by a prosecutor wanting to put me in jail. Tore my life apart. Did your gang stalkers come with subpeonas, confiscation of your property, hunt down everyone who knew you and officially interrogate them? I'd call that gang stalking.

Quote from: K-DogWere that ever to happen to you, then you would be in a unique position to see how things work.

If my gang stalking events happened to you, you would also be in a position to know how my gang stalking worked.

Quote from: K-DogYou, might actually wonder where all the billions in government dark money actually goes.

You might wonder where all your local and state taxes go, to hunt down innocent civilians who dared stay within the law when doing nothing more basic than defending themselves.

Quote from: K-DogAnd once seeing how things are done, you might be less inclined to spout off about shit you know nothing about when it happens again.

Well, I reserve the right to spout off on topics I have little or no experience with same as RE is allowed to spout off on topics he theorizes about. Minor surgery being one of my favorites. Or playing at being geologist. Or motorcycle expert. I love his La Longue Carabine stories best. But fundamentally, you are correct, someone never stood outside my house and watched as I went out. Well...not true....but they weren't trying to hide it.

Quote from: K-DogIt really is a perfect system, people like you are incapable of seeing what you don't want to see.  Personally I want the truth no matter how painful it is.

Oh, we all have our blind spots. Critical, analytic, logical thinking resulting in published science isn't one of mine. Has nothing to do with what I WANT to see...only to see what actually IS.

Science and having it within oneself to do it dispassionately is quite a tool, and can dispatch technical concepts like peak oil just as it can arguments based on supposition, hints, claims of spammers always being the MIB instead of exactly what they appear like, etc etc.

[quote-K-Dog]
You're just applying a label you soaked up like a sponge to dismiss something you don't understand.
[/quote]

You don't have a clue what I don't understand. That was obvious the day you brought "some old Oklahoma guy who told you that conventional oil requires rod lift systems" into your argument many moons ago.

Your argument boils down to "if you don't beleive what I say you are the one who is blind". Might work in conspiracyland where it is swallowed hook, line and sinker, but I don't have the natural predisposition to take the bait without sniffing it first. Having it chemically analyzed. Modeling the fundamentals stochastically to find out of the odds of it being true. Etc etc.

Quote from: K-DogWhat part of 'untraceable surveillance' did you not understand?

* It is interesting how many people who have never had their own website can be so adamant in their belief that the American government would not do such a thing.  Surveil their own citizens without a warrant, heaven forbid.  It would never happen you say.

** In June 2013, Edward Snowden began disclosing classified documents which revealed, the existence of global surveillance programs by the U.S. government, and it's capabilities in cyberspace. 

Do you want to say it never happened?

I say I ran my own website for 4 years, in the earlier internet days.So you can assign that angle to someone else.

I say what Edward Snowden claimed absolutely happened.

I also might calculate odds that you being on the Federal governments radar, with all the power they can bring to bear, is possible. More likely they don't know you from Joe Blow on reddit complaining about his taxes. And that the odds of you just collecting spammers is 95/5 in favor of it being spammers.

You can stop with the high net worth bullshit.  I have part time job in retirement because I have the health to have one, and because I need the money.  Many men my age don't have the health to do what I do, and they care too much about what people might think of them as they are working in their 70's.  Looser Wall-Mart greeter.  Otherwise they would be working too.  The new computer is not going to buy itself.  I loaned myself the money.  I intend to pay myself back.

But I could be wrong, maybe you consider someone born in the 50's who only needs a part time job to live well high net worth.

My technical literacy provides me with the tools to analyze digital surveillance and influence operations at a professional level, and my political writing is the public-facing expression of a mind that thinks in architectures, networks, and systemic collapse. I am not a conspiracy theorist rambling on. I am a measured witness who actually understands how the infrastructure works.  And I have been gang-stalked by the men in black.  And I talked to three of them.  Brief encounters with two of them, and one with whom I had two conversations each about ten to twenty minutes long.

Howevah :  The site is a platform for political and environmental commentary, not a documentation of personal grievances with intelligence agencies.

The government gang-stalkers actually wanted me to talk about the harassment because IT WAS UNTRACEABLE, and without proof I appear to be a total nutjob if I rant about it.  As intended.  As you intend.  To be clear, they did not tell me this directly, but I am smart enough to listen between the sentences and read between the lines.  We established that I am smart enough to do that last week.  In fact when I recognized the bait I realized that most people would take it.  This fish did not bite.  A personal assessment that I am a different in some ways.

I am giving you three days in the cooler for gaslighting me.  You are always telling me to deny my own experience, and I have had enough of that for a few days. 

And the focus is on you, what would a government operative do.
That Rhymes.

• Deny the reality of surveillance
• Insist on mundane explanations
• Encourage the target to doubt themselves
• Remain calm and reasonable while the target becomes increasingly frustrated

https://www.days.so/ (https://www.days.so/)

"This link is interesting, but it doesn't settle the matter. The burden of proof is on you, TDoS. You need to show a tangible connection to this.  Verifiable proof of work or a clear trail in the Wayback Machine. Right now, there is nothing.

Given our history, I'm putting the odds of you bullshitting us at 95/5. RE and I are real people.  If pressed, we can prove it. You, on the other hand, have always hidden behind anonymity. You've had every opportunity to send me your LinkedIn or professional credentials in a private message, but you haven't. You claim to have met RE years ago, yet you refuse to disclose who you actually are. Frankly, that's abusive and strange.

I would add that in addition to all the offenses you listed, he also threw in his usual unrelated Peak Oil analogies and inaccurate characterization of my knowledge and experience.  All of those along with all the ones directed at you are just veiled insults he uses to try to undermine our credibility, since he consistently is unable to do it with an argument based on facts, logic, deduction and Common Fucking Sense.  Far as the "high net worth" shit goes, with you he does it to paint you as a hypocrite, with me it's the reverse to paint me as a failure.  Whether you have money or don't, if you don't hold his world view on the subject of personal wealth, he'll use it in an Ad Hom attack, again to undermine the credibility of the website.  Which in the end really only goes to show how credible our arguments are, because he can't do it following Robert's Rules.

I'll add a few days to this cooler trip for his pot shots at me and general violations of the CoC.

RE

And all the time that you were telling him that if he did not like it here he was welcome to start his own website.  Now he claims he had (years ago) / (or) has one now.  When I go there all I see a well constructed dead end.

Seems a different Wizard of Oz may have been on duty who did not have a complete handle on the historical narrative.  But no proof, I'm just sayin.  No crazy here.

I am SHOCKED!  Shocked I tell you.

I look forward to the inexorable slide to the depth of Davey Jones Locker as Investors look at the P/E ratio of Elon's sales job and their 401K retirement lifeboats start taking on water.  That's even not pricing in a market crash, in which case SpaceX will sink faster than the Titanic after plowing into the iceberg.

The savvy investors will of course be able to take solace in the fact that they generously stuffed the Muskrat's bank account with Billions of FRNs to fill the Trust Funds of his spawn, endless parties for the Supermodel moms and meager paychecks for the Phillipina Nannies who raise them.

Even in a best case scenario, it would take a decade for this White Elephant to turn a profit, and Elon already has plans to further line his pockets by issuing Bonds and loading the company up with debt based on the collateral of the spurious valuation of the stock.  After that, he can rehypothecate the debt by  mortgaging whatever satellites he actually gets into orbit, and then scam the taxpayers for a bailout before he has to face a bankruptcy filing.  Because of course SpaceX is ALREADY TBTF.

Only in Amerika.  Land of Opportunity for the morally and ethically bankrupt.


RE

RE, you met my 'cousin' Todd when you were down here.  He has been working for Space-X in Redmond WA for a few years.  I called him the other day and asked if he was a millionaire yet.  Based on his response his 'options' are in that ball park.  That sounds about right.  I advised him to cash them out and explained that while some people have more money than I do, I am better positioned to survive a crash than someone with a million dollar portfolio. I do not do risk, but I still beat inflation.  Trading liquidity for a few percent but not trading significant risk.

I could do a You Tube channel about this and likely pick up a few thousand a year.  Doom investing, but unloading 18 wheeled trucks into a warehouse part time is way more badass.  And it pays enough with my best investment, Social Security, to leave my other investments alone.  The part time job is like having an extra half million invested at a decent interest rate.  Would an extra half million make me a millionaire?  I'm not going to say.

For those still in the game it appears that success in America now depends on how close you are to a billionaire.  Like the old song goes:

QuoteDon't you know about the new fashion, honey?  All ya need are looks and a whole lotta money.

Looks optional.  Forget making things, and providing services that people actually need.  Forget about trading time in honest labor for cash.  No,  America became a casino, and without the cheap drinks, and cheap food a casino should have.  And I am too old to gamble.

In America, if you are not extracting rent from somebody, you are nobody.  France was once this ugly.

Trading at over 100 times trailing revenue while reporting a $4.9 billion net loss in 2025, SpaceX's valuation demands near-flawless execution.  SpaceX's accelerated lockup structure allows insider selling sooner than the traditional 180-day window, adding share-supply pressure to an already-stretched valuation.

A MEDIAN return of -32% for mega IPOs.  lol.  If SpaceX even comes in at -50% this year and investors only lose half their money they will be lucky.  If they have a buy & hold strategy, maybe they'll break even in 10 years.

This IPO had LOSER written all over it from the get go.

At roughly $2.4 trillion, investors are paying more than 100 times trailing revenue. That's a valuation that assumes years of near-flawless execution across rockets, satellites, and artificial intelligence.

100X revenue with PERFECT execution over at least a decade?  When has Elon ever had perfect execution and met the targets he set at the beginning?  When and if anything he promises actually comes and works, it's still at least 5 years behind schedule.  Still waiting for those self-driving carz. But of course it never has to turn a profit, just keep splitting the stock and dragging in more investors and building more factories and the stock keeps going up.  Maybe he'll pull it off again with SpaceX, the market can remain irrational longer than anyone can stay solvent.  Such is the game of Casino Capitalism.

RE

Lively day in Collapse!  In addition to the above highlights

Hello, this is Gail Krishnan writing to you from Singapore. Welcome to today's edition of CNBC's Daily Open.

On Wall Street, a rotation out of big tech dragged the S&P and Nasdaq lower. That offset more encouraging newsflow on Iran as the U.S. agreed to waive Iranian oil sanctions for 60 days.

Meanwhile, 10 Downing Street will soon get a new occupant, for the seventh time in 10 years.

Japan has long held the dubious honor of a revolving door of prime ministers. But on the 10th anniversary of Brexit, Britain is finding itself in increasingly familiar territory.

Another UK PM bites the dust! Now they can hold a referendum to Un-Brexit!

Iran is now officially ahhead of where they were before the war.  Chump has lifted the sanctions and they can sell their oil.

Elon already took out a $20B UNSECURED bridge loan to keep SpaceX floating.  Can't he just cover that out of his Petty Cash?  Oh, right, OPM.

RE