/biz/ - Business & Finance

>>19571267
It’s actually not illegal anymore. They changed that law a week or two ago.

>>19571267
Who says the dow jones can’t go to 50,000?

Pic related.

>>19571319
Link?

>>19571267
unemployment is good to the economy

>>19572380
Like how? Unemployment leads to deflation which leads to stagnation which leads to starvation and poverty which leads to many deaths.

>>19572958
Thinning the herd of incompetent people and pointless job is a good thing. We're paying people to stay home, and they're still complaining and killing themselves. No reason to pay for it.

>>19573540
and what happens when legions of unemployed people start looting residential areas rather than shops/businesses as they are now?

Read this:
> A ‘misclassification error’ made the May unemployment rate look better than it is.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/06/05/may-2020-jobs-report-misclassification-error/

>>19573571
You shoot them

>>19573686
They shoot you back. Civil war?

>>19573571
Don't be weak. Paying people for existing whether through UBI or some made up job that wouldn't exist in the free market, out of some fear if you don't then hordes pf people looting if you don't is extortion.
>>19573757
Then the hordes will be thinned.

>>19573757
>They shoot you back
That's cute that you think they're armed

You obviously aren't from the USA

>>19571267
It's nothing abnormal, there are two kinds of collapses; European and Latin American.
In a European collapse everything breaks down, gets sold off, prices dip, and the bad debt/problems get wiped away. There is some hard temporary hurt, but things recover.
In a Latin American collapse everything starts to break down, get sold off, etc. but the govt REFUSES to let that stand. So they print as much money as possible and inject shitloads of money into the stock market. So the currency devalues instead of the market. That's why in Venezuela, the stock market was at new ATHs while there was literal mass starvation in the street.
Now that America's demographics are shifting more Hispanic, we are beginning to shift our bubble pops towards the Latin American collapse style. That's it. We'll just print infinite bucks before letting stocks go down.

>>19574479
>Now that America's demographics are shifting more Hispanic, we are beginning to shift our bubble pops towards the Latin American collapse style.
Nigga this shit's been happening for decades.

>>19574508
Printing money is absolutely normal because population is growing and there must be money for everyone, otherwise your children would die.

Retail speculation is driving this. "Back to normal" retards buying calls and leverages ETFs. When this shit pops it will drop hard.

>>19575464
I want to believe this but it can still run a long way on bullshit. Something something irrational something something solvent

Here’s a simple model for stocks and the pandemic:

1. The price of a company’s stock is the present value of the company’s expected future earnings.
2. Earnings for the next little while will be real real bad, since the economy has shut down.
3. Every company’s earnings from, say, 2021 until perpetuity will be “normal,” in some sense. The economy was growing in 2019, and in 2021 it will get back on that growth trend. Companies that were good in 2019 will be good in 2021. If in 2019 you built a stock-price model that projected out 100 years of income, you will have to adjust one or two columns for 2020 and 2021, but after that everything can stay exactly the same.
4. Except companies that go bankrupt; if you go bankrupt, your shareholders will get no future earnings. (Maybe your current creditors will get those earnings, or maybe you will disappear and there will be no earnings, but anyway your current shareholders will be zeroed.)

None of these things is obviously true, and point 3 in particular depends on a lot of assumptions about the progress of the pandemic and the speed of reopening and changed in behavior and the loss of workers and know-how and a million other things. (And of course you didn’t build a 100-year model, etc.)

But it’s a model. In the New York Times Magazine, Michael Steinberger asks “What Is the Stock Market Even for Anymore?,” and one possible answer is, you know, discounting the present value of all of a company’s future earnings in perpetuity. Like a lot of people, Steinberger is struggling with why the stock market is so cheerful (the S&P 500 index is down about 6% year-to-date, and up about 36% from its March low) while the economy is so bad (businesses are closed, revenue has collapsed, the U.S. unemployment rate has soared to 14.7%).

>>19575532
There are grim possible answers about inequality, the allocation of wealth between labor and capital, gains of big businesses at the expense of small ones, etc., but there is also a more neutral possible answer about allocation in time. If companies lose profits for a while and then get back to having profits again, and if discount rates are low in a zero-interest-rate world, then their stocks shouldn’t go down that much even if they have no revenue for months. It’s just months; stock prices reflect decades. Steinberger talked to Jeremy Siegel:

Siegel, who is 74 and teaches finance at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, is a prominent scholar of the markets, a fixture on CNBC who is often referred to as ‘‘the wizard of Wharton.’’ …

For Siegel, there was nothing strange about the market’s rising despite the gruesome unemployment figures: Investors already knew they would be ugly. ‘‘It’s Principle 1 of Finance 101: Anything that is expected doesn’t move the market,’’ he told me. People who were dismayed by its upswing since mid-March didn’t understand how the market works. ‘‘Over 90 percent of the value of stocks is dependent on earnings more than a year in the future,’’ he said. ‘‘The market is very forward-looking.’’ Investors weren’t thinking six months ahead; they were thinking a year or two ahead, Siegel said, by which point the virus would probably have been brought under control. ‘‘We’ll have a U-shaped recovery, not a V, but the market is looking at the upper part of the U,’’ Siegel said.

>>19575532
I don’t know about the epidemiological or economic claims here about the timing or shape of the recovery; I am interested in the financial claim that “the market is very forward-looking.” It does seem like the simplest explanation, no? A pandemic crushes revenues. Stocks fall on general uncertainty and a fear of financial crisis and widespread bankruptcies, which would wipe out profits in perpetuity. The fears of financial crisis are resolved, more or less by the Fed and Congress pumping money into companies to prevent panic, so the bankruptcy risk is more contained. Stocks return to a price level that suggests a terrible year, followed by mostly normal. The market might be wrong about that, of course, but that does seem to be what it implies.

This is all trivial and obvious, the simplest possible textbook model of how the stock market works, the one that every sophisticated person finds simplistic and naive. “Har har har stock prices reflect the present value of future earnings,” people say knowingly when Tesla jumps around a lot for no reason.

In particular, a lot of people have spent years saying that the public stock market was focused only on next quarter’s earnings and forced companies to prioritize short-term profits over long-term investment. Startup founders wanted to stay private because they feared the short-termism of the public markets, public chief executive officers wanted to go private to escape that short-termism, commentators argued that the markets were destroying long-term value.

I have always had my doubts about the “short-termism” critique; it is often a way for corporate managers to defend bad decisions by saying that they’re actually long-term decisions. And now, you know, here’s a data point. Now next quarter’s earnings will be bad for almost everyone, and the stock market has essentially shrugged it off. “Ehh, what does next quarter matter,” the market basically said, “we’re in it for the long term.”

>>19575532
Yeah but a goal-seeked market is really just shadow inflation/wealth transfer from public coffers to private hands. Don’t fight the fed

>>19571267
It means this shit is fake as fuck and who cares as long as we are making money.

>>19575532
>The price of a company’s stock is the present value of the company’s expected future earnings.

The price of a stock is supply and demand. Not a lot of people selling after a 30%+ drop (might as well fucking hold) combined with dip buyers and FOMO from missing the recovery from the 2018 crash. Fundamentals like a company's future expected earnings mean nothing right now.

What people don't get is that the economy was on its last legs in dec-jan before corona. The shutdowns and stimulus might have made the crash + dead cat bounce more volatile but we are heading into a longer term recession that would have happened regardless of corona. Buying right now is like buying the peak of 2000.

>>19574479
>In a Latin American collapse everything starts to break down, get sold off, etc. but the govt REFUSES to let that stand. So they print as much money as possible and inject shitloads of money into the stock market. So the currency devalues instead of the market.
so a current USA style collapse.
got it.

>>19575532
It’s psychosis, primed by corona. Once you have managed to convince yourself that covid is a hoax and a nothingburger (110k dead so far WITH lockdowns) you have detached sufficiently from reality to think the stocks can keep going up despite the underlying (the economy) going to shit.

>>19575544
> ‘It’s Principle 1 of Finance 101: Anything that is expected doesn’t move the market,’’ he told me.
That implies the whole recovery is based on positive surprises.
What were those positive surprises between March and now that all were unexpected by the market?

>>19574508
now we pay the price because boomers and nigger politicians wanted cheap labor and increased real estate prices.

>>19575561
How long term? If you hold through a crash and it takes you a decade or more to break even, as per usual for crashes, then that is simply not a rational thing to do compared to selling with a stop loss and getting back in lower, during the climb back up. Telling yourself you have a “long term” strategy isn’t reasonable given the opportunity cost.
So the market can’t pretend to invest with decade long outlook, much less a century. About one or two years is possible, but then the market is making a huge mistake by placing the value for earnings over the next two years around ATH.

>>19575665
>The price of a stock is supply and demand
The supply and demand are functions of expected future earnings. If expectations on future earnings go down, demand goes down while supply (people wanting to offload their bags) goes up. Together this drives the price down.

> future expected earnings mean nothing right now
This theory has nothing backing it. It’s the idea that the stock market has turned into a shitcoin with no underlying value, only pure speculation that a greater fool will come along that you can sell your bags to at a higher price. The stock market is often described that way, in disparaging terms. But it’s not true, such a market is an actual pyramid scheme and wouldn’t last long. The real mechanism is that you buy a stock that you think will have a positive development as to its earnings, when that happens you sell to someone for whom it’s rational to buy your bags, you’re not looking for a greater fool.

>>19576223

Future earnings is just one of a ton of different factors that may make up a person's valuation of a certain company which is just one of many reasons a person may choose to buy/sell that company's stock.

This should be obvious: future earnings have all nosedived yet the market is at all time highs right now. Clearly future earnings are not the only thing that people use to value stocks.

>This theory has nothing backing it. It’s the idea that the stock market has turned into a shitcoin with no underlying value, only pure speculation that a greater fool will come along that you can sell your bags to at a higher price.

What other purpose is there to own a stock, than to sell at a higher price? Yeah, you can consider dividends (not much different than a stock buy back) or asset allocation in liquidations. But 99.9% of people buying stocks are hoping to sell them at a higher price.

The valuations of stocks are based on supply and demand. And demand is almost entirely speculative (people buy thinking the price will go up). The supply of the stock can be increased by the company through issuance of new shares to raise money, or decreased through buy backs and dividends. This is equivalent to token inflation, deflation / burning, and airdrops / staking rewards.

Stock market participation is at all time highs. Asset allocation to stocks are at all time highs due to extremely low return of lower risk investments. For the past decade public companies as a whole have net bought back shares while also racking up record debt. This all drives up valuations of stocks well beyond any fundamental valuation, and its obvious from w/e metric you look at. Stocks are overvalued historically, possibly more than they have ever been.

Bitcoin gonna have to decouple and idk if that’s possible.

>>19575939
that ten million people arent dead yet

How much can the tourism sector affect the market?

Because I doubt even if literally everything opens right this moment with zero regulations there won't be even 50% of last years earnings made there

>>19576658
So the markets thought we would see 10 million dead /during lockdowns/?
Are you telling me markets have simply never understood a single fact about the virus? Wouldn’t surprise me that much, it seems a lot of people have a very hard time understanding basic epidemiology. But then I suppose that the fact that we’ll see millions dead after lockdowns will come as yet a big surprise?

>>19575886
>>19575561
the only economic theory that has been proven by real-world data is this one: deflation happens before hyperinflation. we're now in the grey area transition period between deflation and hyperinflation.

economy was already hitting the skids back in late 2019, that's why the repo lending started up around nov-dec 2019. retails sales were already slowing down in years leading up to 2019. in other words, pee pee poo poo. even if things "should" go down, they won't because the central banks and politicians want to maintain a status quo of "everything is fine".

>>19576522
>Clearly future earnings are not the only thing that people use to value stocks.
Clearly. But it’s not clear they are being rational. We can’t assume they are because if market participants were not wrong regularly, people wouldn’t lose a lot of money in the markets.

> People buy stocks to sell higher
Yes, but the rational reason to expect someone might want to buy your bags higher is an improved earnings outlook for the company.
You might add more components than earnings to the fundamentals, but discounting fundamentals to treat the stock market as a game of pure speculation unfortunately does turn it into a pyramid scheme/a shitcoin and such a market can evaporate wholesale in minutes.

>>19576900

>Clearly. But it’s not clear they are being rational. We can’t assume they are because if market participants were not wrong regularly, people wouldn’t lose a lot of money in the markets.

What do you mean by wrong? Even if everyone knew the future earnings of companies with 100% accuracy, people would still lose/make the exact same amount of money. Because the trading of stocks don't create money, they just transfer it around. In the past decade companies have been net buying back shares and issuing dividends so more people make money than lose, at the cost of public company debt rising to all time highs. There are times when that is not true, especially in recessions/depressions, where companies will need to net issue shares to raise cash, and as a whole more money will be lost in the market.

>Yes, but the rational reason to expect someone might want to buy your bags higher is an improved earnings outlook for the company.

Actually, I'd say most people buying right now are primarily thinking about JPOW's printer than the company's fundamentals.

>You might add more components than earnings to the fundamentals, but discounting fundamentals to treat the stock market as a game of pure speculation unfortunately does turn it into a pyramid scheme/a shitcoin and such a market can evaporate wholesale in minutes.

The stock market lost like a third of its value in a month in march. I believe we were near the peak of a speculative bubble in dec-jan anyway, regardless of corona. The only thing that has changed is that there has been an excuse (unlimited QE, "back to normal") for people to run it up once more.

>>19577115
> Actually, I'd say most people buying right now are primarily thinking about JPOW's printer than the company's fundamentals
Exactly, and that’s also what I mean by “wrong”.

> trading stocks doesn’t create money
That’s exactly where you’re wrong. The purpose of the stock market is to act as an efficient resource allocation mechanism for the economy. By continuously moving money to where it does most good, stock traders icrease the money making capability of the underlying economy.
This is exactly the function that is being corrupted when money is invested based on Mr Powell’s printing press, with the result that the value of the stock market and the economy as a whole goes down when the stock market is no longer efficiently fulfilling its role in the system. This is why so many expect the market to collapse like a house of cards after the “recovery”/return to normal.

>>19571267
Friendly reminder that over 2 trillions dollars were printed by money going brrrr
Dow should go even higher than that.

>>19577253
Friendly reminder that the stock market was in such a bad shape that it took 2 trillion fresh dollars to save it, and that since none of the problems have been addressed an ATH valuation for a market with 2 trillion worth of unaddressed problems is not sustainable.

>>19577253
It is a gigantic mistake to think of the 2T as the size of the gift to stock holders - it is the size of the patch needed to keep you afloat. It is 2T of bad news, not good news.

Small businesses and travel industry may lose value but what if all the value is being eaten up by larger companies?
Says for example small oil company goes bankrupt but the value isn't loost in the market because their assets are bought up for cheap and then made more valuable by being utilized by a larger company with better resources

>>19577495
A lot of these companies got a legal excuse to layoff deadweight and thin their payroll. The people who were laid off are subsidized to consume fulltime since they get unemployment. It doesn't have to make sense, but a lot of these companies will make even more money.

>>19577253

I went over this in the /pmg/ thread (>>19573045) but it bears repeating here. The present stampede into the stock market is soon going to be its own demise. On Friday, yields rose from 0.70 to 0.90. This is a disaster for the Fed. It means that even five trillion in money-printing can't suppress yields. If yields go up any more, there will be an almighty crash in stocks. This crash will be far worse than the one which we had in March, since, this time, all the weak-handed Robinhood retail speculators have flooded in and are buying up everything in sight--even bankrupt stock like Hertz. Now as we saw in late 2018, the American economy is so weak and leveraged that, when yields go to even 2 or 3%, stocks crash (picture related). Q. E. restarting again in response to this is when the price of gold began its present rise from $1200 to $1500.

The reason why rising yields cause stocks to crash is that yields compete with the stock-market: they offer risk-free reward. The only way to avert such a crash is for the Fed to impose a formal cap on yields. A cap on yields would mean that it would have to print another twenty trillion or more. This would result in the same kind of hyperinflationary environment which we saw in the 70s and 80s. Stocks would then continue to rise in nominal terms, as they did in Venezuela or Zimbabwe; but in real times they would crash. Mean-while, expect a crash in the bond market, resulting from a crash in real yields, to cause gold, silver, and miners to soar to unprecedented heights; because precious metals would be the only safe haven.

In sum, the Fed has two options: let yields continue to rise, and crash the market by 90%; or cap yields to prop up the market, and begin hyperinflation. There is no way of escaping this dilemma.

>>19577686
>If yields go up any more, there will be an almighty crash in stocks
Like why? Because people will start to sell stocks to have that incredible 1% Federal Bonds interest rate? It's ridiculous.

>>19577744

It is a fact that, in 2018, stocks kept crashing when yields were at a mere 2 or 3%, and that the Fed was forced to restart Q. E. as a response to this. See my picture. Interest-rates have been kept low for so long, and the U. S. economy has become so feeble, that what you call ridiculous is actually now reality. The slightest tendency to de-leverage it causes it to collapse like a house of cards.

>>19577236

When you buy a stock on the secondary market, that money goes no where but the seller's account. Trading a stock creates no money.

>>19577744

Because stocks are valued in comparison to risk free return. Stock value is inversely correlated with interest rate.

>>19578749
Which is why in a healthy market companies are selling their stock to turn that capital infused into productivity, rather than rebuying stock.

>>19575464
this. everyone and their mothers doing stonks now.

>>19575511
this too. it can be a long time.

my approach is to find quantifiable features like the number of people unemployed, the debt per wagie houshold and much other stuff. then i try build a model of reality as unopinionated as possible. then i try to place the quantifiable features in that model and with a bit luck it's at least a bit descreptive and i get a feeling how accurate my view of the world is. then i try to find further short term developments with deductive reasoning. this allows me to build an opinion about the market and place my BETS or study potential companies who might profit of a trend. i do that as a hobby and i lose more money than i invest. in my opinikn it's the best i can do when it comes to speculating because most media tells you opinions not facts because it's easy to find some douche posing as warren buffet and talking nonsense with fervour.

>>19575665
>The price of a stock is supply and demand

This guy get it. The only impact of the fundamental is on demand, but it not all of it. A stock have way more utility and store of value than simple "future earning over x period of time". Stocks are up, but bonds are way down.
The stock market is so "cheerful" because everyone is expecting inflation and stocks are perceived as a better store of value than cash in case of hyperinflation.

>>19576900
>You might add more components than earnings to the fundamentals, but discounting fundamentals to treat the stock market as a game of pure speculation unfortunately does turn it into a pyramid scheme/a shitcoin and such a market can evaporate wholesale in minutes
Not before the election.

>>19579625

>Not before the election.

You never know. As George Gammon says, confidence is the most important thing propping the market up. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=macsrQQeVO8)) This is why, on the one hand, stocks have sometimes surged for months long before the Fed actually injected any money into the system. And, on the other, why all the Q. E. which the Fed kept announcing during the March crash was not enough to halt the downturn. If that ten-year yield keeps rising as fast as it is, or if some other black swan event comes along, look out below. An avalanche of stop-losses will trigger, and the retail traders will stampede out as quickly as they stampeded in.

>>19574223
>Nigs aren't armed
You clearly aren't from the US either or you some faggot from the suburbs and have never met a darkie.

>>19577686

Just published on ZeroHedge, shortly after I made this post: "A Sudden, Sharp Spike In Yields Will Cause A Stock Market Correction"

According to the article, we could get YCC as early as Wednesday. Things are moving incredibly quickly.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/sudden-sharp-spike-yields-will-cause-stock-market-correction

>>19575665
Yep. You're completely and utterly correct in your assessment minus your predictions which I'm willing to forgive because you likely recognize the speculative nature of prediction just based on the rest of your post.
>>19576223
You're looking at this from the perspective of a guy who has never interacted with the market meaningfully, but instead read a textbook about how the market theoretically works written by a guy who also has never interacted with the market meaningfully.

>>19571267
>businesses still closed
>people got 1200$ trumpbux
>businesses got hundreds of billions
>interest rates still low enough to just borrow forever
The stock market is NEVER going down. The US dollar is infinite, backed by the full faith and credit of the US government (ie the military) and until the hypersonic missiles start flying it will stay that way.

>>19581143

Long-term interest rates (treasury yields), because of the stampede into the stock-market, have already spiked at 0.90 despite trillions in Q. E. If rates get even a little higher, there will be a market crash just like the one which we had in late 2018 (when they were only 3 percent). A formal cap will be the only way to keep them down; and a formal cap can only be imposed by printing at least 20 trillion. A bond-market crash and vicious cycle of Q. E., leading, ultimately, to hyperinflation, will be the result.

Here's the problem:

>Corona happens
>Everything closes
>FED pumps money into the hands of the banks like no tomorrow
>banks keep looking at the job reports and earnings forecasts in the future and think "Wow, it would be RETARDED to invest in the actual economy right now."
>money just funnels into stocks

You're right in that they don't want to invest in real sector. Why would they? Companies all around are laying off employees. You have to let the real world dip before you buy into it but the FED went full retard and thought they'd buy the top

>>19581225
>>19581143
The only outcomes are
>Default
>Hyperinflation
and you're damned if you think the US will default

>>19581143
>The US dollar is infinite, backed by the full faith and credit of the US government (ie the military) and until the hypersonic missiles start flying it will stay that way
This is why it will fail, the government is pozzed and quality of life has barely improved since they took this shit over

>>19571267
PRICED IN BRO

is it true i heard we solved the red candle problem?

>>19577253
Does that mean a V Shape recovery is a meme

>>19581424

People forget that ancient Rome was the most powerful empire in the world, but that, when their money was debased, they could no longer pay their soldiers, and their society collapsed. No money means no military.

>>19571267
Heading towards "new paradigm" or "back to normal".

Either way doesn't matter. Nothing new under the sun. There's a reason whales are holding liquid on the sidelines just waiting, waiting, waiting. People who FOMO will lose. Some retards will get lucky, most won't.

Many ways to play the market, but buying company X at 2500 times earnings is straight retarded unless you're day trading. Good luck with that.

Patience. Patience. Patience.

>>19571267
I have to say thank you for this thread because /smg/ is always full of delusional bullfags, actual good information on this thread.

>>19581644

"New paradigm" this time is definitely the attitude that "The Fed has a printing press, central bankers can do whatever they want to the markets, front-run the Fed, stocks can only go up," etc. etc.

>>19575886
What?

Here: corona is a hoax. By that I mean is just a flu.

Also, markets are in a retarded bubble that just had its initial pop. Going down at varying rates in the future.

Imagine not being able to think those two things at the same time.

>>19577253
why inflation not going up ?

>>19581693
Sure feels that way. Also sportsballs are shut down so lots of gambling money rushed into stocks, sucking in even more suckers...

>>19581698

Helicopter money means that inflation in consumer prices must happen this time. The gap between the rich and poor, and the real economy and the stock market, is now too great to pump asset prices and call it a day's work, as in 2008. The riots which we are seeing now are only a taste of what is going to come.

Inflation in consumer prices will really commence when two conditions are met: 1) More helicopter money, 2) Greater velocity of money as the economy re-opens from the lockdowns. We are already seeing it in things like beef and lumber.

>>19581698
Gallon of milk up $2 in a week. Pack of 6 hotdogs $7. Meat sections understocked.

No inflation?...

>>19581820

Retail investors on Robinhood pushed the price of Hertz up 100%, despite the fact that the company is bankrupt and the stock is completely worthless. It sounds like something which you would read about in a history book about tulip mania or the Great Depression.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/bankrupt-hertz-stock-soars-100-relentess-flood-retail-daytraders

>>19581865
Bankruptcy?
Bullish!

>>19581533
There were other places though. In this world there is only America and the US economy.
>>19581299
You're damned if you think hyperinflation will happen either. You clearly haven't read up on modern market theory lmao. See market fundamentals and shit matter when you're dealing with actual money. With pure fiat, and especially pure fiat that is totally unstoppable like the US dollar, it's pure psychology. As long as the US government can just kill you if you disagree that the dollar has a non hyperinflated value, the value isn't hyperinflated.

>>19582042

>In this world there is only America and the US economy.

There's a lot more diversity in competitors now than you had in antiquity. China was a powerful Empire, but it was a long way away from Rome. The only serious competitor which the Romans had was the Persians. Other than them, all you had were tribes of barbarians. But even the barbarians could conquer the Romans once they had debased their coinage.

When China, Russia, etc., who have been net buyers of gold since 2008, show their hand and overthrow the dollar, the U. S. will not have the strength to invade them and to do them what they did to Gaddafi with his gold dinar.

>>19582113
We can argue the so called collapse of the Roman empire all day, that's not the point. You're only agreeing with me. Until the US military is defeatable, the dollar is king and will have fine value.

>>19582198
America will be pointing that green gun at its own head soon enough anon.

>>19582198

The Roman army collapsed when the Roman coinage was debased, despite the fact that the only strong competitor which they had was the Persians. So that shows to me that the U. S. military will go the same way once hyperinflation sets in. To say that a strong military can prop up a debased currency is to put the cart before the horse.