Of Yetis and Defunct Currencies

Here's some light entertainment after a week of foreboding currency crisis talk... Saturday, July 13th, 2013     Of Yetis and Defunct Currencies   America's favorite fun-filled monetary trivia game... In case you missed it: a tall economic tale for your enjoyment... Your creditors have you by the pelotas? Not a problem... wage war! The week's top-five essays and more!     How to collect up to $1,293 today…  We've discovered a simple strategy that hands down beats dividends, bonds and annuities for generating retirement income. Now, in a special presentation, we reveal the "Hollywood Contract" strategy to earn instant income… and how to collect up to $1,293 today. Click here to discover how.     Peter Coyne, playing game show host... Peter Coyne After a week of currency crises on the brain, we offer a little light entertainment. Time to play America's favorite fun-filled game: "Which one of these currencies lost its value the fastest?" Was it... a) The Yugoslavian Dinar b) The Austro-Hungarian Pengo c) The Old Belarusian Ruble Submit your guesses and any other notable now-worthless currency of your choosing to dr@dailyreckoning.com. Bonus points for the correct chronology of all three. Even more for the events that precipitated their demise! No Googling. While you're mulling them over, take a look at this week's top-five essays on currency crises as well the economic tale we authored below...     UNBELIEVABLE what this guy was actually selling to unsuspecting buyers! And people were drinking it!   Today, that business has grown into a $60 billion industry.   Click here if you think that's outrageous!     This Week in the Daily Reckoning... The Truth About Your Money By Alasdair Macleod Imagine measuring something with a ruler that keeps changing. As you could probably imagine, it would be pretty frustrating -- even harmful in some cases. Well, Alasdair Macleod writes to tell you that you very well could be measuring your most important economic decisions using such a measuring stick... The Asian Giant Stampeding Into Gold By Frank Holmes Want to see a behemoth churn the gold market like you've never seen? While the U.S. is skedaddling from the yellow metal, certain countries are doing something very alarming -- and one Pacific nation is leading the charge. If you plan on timing the gold market, you'd better read what Mr. Holmes has to tell you... A Game of Currency Wars By Addison Wiggin When your No. 1 creditor has you by the pelotas, what keeps you up at night? That you'll be called up and told to make good? Well, the U.S. worries are no different, except that Uncle Sam has a trick up his sleeve. It's the same one trick all nations are using... Your Personal Gold Standard By James Rickards Does the country you live in have a gold standard? Would you like it to? According to Jim Rickards, you don't need to wait around for your nation's politicos to have a change of heart -- there's a way you can take action on your own, without sacrificing the discipline of the gold standard... Dr. Gono or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Inflation By Bill Bonner Un classique par Bill Bonner. Believe it or not, five years later, both Robert Mugabe and Gideon Gono of fifty-trillion-dollar bank note infamy are still at large, running Zimbabwe. Either Zimbabweans are very forgiving or very frightened of something. Mr. Bonner explains how the African nation has foreshadowed the United States' fate.     What Obama Can't Do, These SIX Events Could I urge you, watch this eye-opening video presentation and find out WHICH six "jackpot" events are about to change your life...    And could even make you richer, healthier and happier... in ways no sycophantic bureaucrat ever could!   Click here and find about the SIX EVENTS about to change your life forever.     In Case You Missed It… The Ballad of Sun Po Tai by Pete Coyne   "You guys seem to have forgotten how the economy nearly collapsed," writes one indignant reader. "What kind of freedom do the tens of millions of Americans living in abject poverty have? When the government of the people tries to ameliorate the suffering and level the playing field, 'they' start whining about how the government is taking away their wealth." Ha. Ha. Ha! After forecasting a demographic meltup, here, a housing collapse, here, a debt crisis, here, we clearly failed to notice that the economy nearly collapsed. How did we miss it? As to the rest… allow us to further confuse you with an allegory: "Long ago, in early August of 2007, a trillion-pound Yeti named Sun Po Tai descended on Lower Manhattan. The monster, hungry, began eating all the pigeons between East 14th Street and Battery Park. Perhaps you've read the news accounts… "Two investigators were summoned by Mayor Bloomberg to assess the crisis: one a Nobel laureate from Princeton, the other a lowly scribe for The Daily Reckoning. "The professor arrived early and saw the pigeon population was dwindling… soon the Yeti would eat something a bit more… human. It would be devastating. "So in an effort to 'ameliorate the suffering,' or at least the potential suffering, of the good people of Wall Street, the professor filed a recommendation with the mayor… and followed up with a barrage of newspaper columns suggesting that the government hold a $152 billion bond drive to purchase more pigeons for the Yeti to eat. "'Maybe he'll leave once he's had his fill,' the professor reasoned, quite reasonably. "The people rallied, the bonds were sold — some were bought by willing partners overseas — the pigeons were bought and the Yeti ate them one by one until they too were all gone. "But Sun Po Tai didn't leave…in fact, he now weighed 2 trillion pounds. "The professor stuck to his guns. He filed a new recommendation and wrote more Op-Eds and encouraged the purchase of even more pigeons: '$85 billion worth per month… that ought to do it. The central bank could even buy them up. Whatever it takes to get this the monster to leave.' "Some people thought, Hmmn… the Yeti doubled in weight pretty quickly… are we just feeding the beast? But the professor wrote for a prestigious column in the city's paper… and he had a Nobel Prize pendant around his neck. 'He must know what's going on behind the scenes,' they reasoned. So they shrugged and went along… "Around that time, the lowly Daily Reckoning scribe finally showed up. He got a look at the pigeon carcasses in Battery Park. Saw the footprints Sun Po Tai had left in the playground near Ground Zero, where his kids used to play. Not knowing what else to do, he stepped into an Irish pub called Mick's for a glass of pinot grigio. "The only seat available happened to be next to a bespectacled fellow who resembled the old cartoon character Mr. Magoo. The strange man had his nose in a pint and was mumbling something about Kondratiev waves and the True Money Supply… "'Drat!' the scribe heard him say. 'Savings represent the future!' "'What's troubling you, mister?' our friend the scribe asked, concerned about his fellow man, as always. "'It's all a big mistake,' Magoo grumbled back. 'One we can't escape.' "'What is… the Yeti?' the scribe asked. Then he wondered aloud, 'Has anyone found out where it came from in the first place?' "'Yeah,' Magoo replied, brandishing a name badge from the Department of Health and Human Services. 'An experiment gone awry… a government bionics program designed to manage the risk the pigeons posed to public health. Little buggers crap all over the place.' "'Hmnn…' The scribe took a sip of his wine. 'But aren't we now printing money…to buy debt…to buy more pigeons?' "'Exactly,' Magoo grumbled, taking a sip of his beer. 'We would have been better off just leaving them alone…' His voice trailed off. "'Hmmmn…' The scribe left the city." We'll give you the weekend to savor the irony, Peter Coyne For The Daily Reckoning BE SURE TO ADD dr@dailyreckoning.com to your address book.   Additional Articles & Commentary: To end your Daily Reckoning e-mail subscription and associated external offers sent from Daily Reckoning, feel free to [cancel]. By submitting your email address, you consent to Agora Financial delivering daily email issues and advertisements. The Daily Reckoning is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy. We do not rent or share your email address. Please read our Privacy Statement. For any further comments or concerns please email us at dr@dailyreckoning.com. If you are you having trouble receiving your Daily Reckoning subscription, you can ensure its arrival in your mailbox by whitelisting the Daily Reckoning. © 2013 Agora Financial, LLC. 808 Saint Paul Street, Baltimore MD 21202. A lthough our employees may answer your general customer service questions, they are not licensed under securities laws to address your particular investment situation. No communication by our employees to you should be deemed as personalized investment advice. We expressly forbid our writers from having a financial interest in any security they personally recommend to our readers. All of our employees and agents must wait 24 hours after on-line publication or 72 hours after the mailing of a printed-only publication prior to following an initial recommendation.Any investments recommended in this letter should be made only after consulting with your investment advisor and only after reviewing the prospectus or financial statements of the company.