Off The Cuff: Rolling Over

In this week's Off The Cuff podcast, Chris and John Rubino discuss:

• Rolling Over
  • Auto and trophy homes sales are softening
• BS From The BLS
  • Its statistics look increasingly falsified
• Rigged Elections, Rigged Markets
  • We're living with both
• It's All About The Debt
  • And the system can't take too much more of it

This week Chris and John note with interest the growing number of signs across the corporate landscape that the economy is indeed rolling over. Don't expect to see this supported by the stats issued by government agencies like the BLS, though — their output is becoming blatantly bastardized with phony 'adjustments', all made to give the impression everything is still rosy.

And while the delusions will continue as long as they can be stretched out by the authorities, Chris and John both expect reality to start intervening shortly — especially as it relates to the massive debt bubble that has built up:

Corporate debt, you’re right, is one of the strange obvious ones because corporations in the US have been buying back their shares with borrowed money for several years and that’s been one of the big props in the stock market. And now they’ve reached the point where corporate debt is at record levels and a lot of these companies are being punished rather than rewarded for borrowing more money to buy back their stock.