NXR Podcast - THE LIVESTREAM - Job Numbers Plummet | Is The Market About to Crash?
Aired: 2025-09-24
Duration: 01:06:21


=== Market Crash Concerns (03:43) ===

[00:00:00]  Leave us a five star review on your favorite podcast platform.
[00:00:04]  I get it.
[00:00:04]  It's annoying.
[00:00:05]  Everybody asks, but I'm going to tell you why.
[00:00:07]  When you give us a positive review, what that does is it triggers the algorithm so that our podcast shows up on more people's news feeds.
[00:00:16]  You and I both know that this ministry is willing to talk about things that most ministries aren't.
[00:00:21]  We need this content for the glory of God to reach more people's ears.
[00:00:32]  Markets are officially at an all time high, right?
[00:00:35]  We had a scare earlier in the year, in the month of April.
[00:00:38]  We dipped crazy.
[00:00:40]  It was quite the correction, and it happened very quickly, suddenly.
[00:00:44]  And this was due to Trump's tariffs.
[00:00:46]  It scared the market.
[00:00:47]  People were thinking wait a second, we need cheap money and we need globalism in order to continue to trim pennies off of every single dollar and have cheap labor and be able to set up our American companies.
[00:01:00]  India and all around the world.
[00:01:02]  And Trump's going to mess that up because he's going to do something positive for America.
[00:01:05]  And something positive for America is negative for, you know, the globo homo economic market.
[00:01:12]  And so we had this big scare.
[00:01:13]  We had a lot of sell off and all those kinds of things.
[00:01:15]  And ultimately, what has happened is on the one hand, and I'm not super excited about this, but on the one hand, it's undeniable the tariffs have turned out to be milder than they were originally proposed to be.
[00:01:27]  In typical fashion, Trump tends to have a louder bark than he does bite.
[00:01:32]  Right.
[00:01:33]  So the bark was bigger than his bite.
[00:01:35]  And that's pretty much Trump on most things.
[00:01:37]  I appreciate Trump, but that tends to be his MO.
[00:01:41]  And that's been his MO with tariffs in the economy.
[00:01:44]  And so, on that news of tariffs not being quite as extreme as what they were originally proposed to be, the market began to ease, began to recover.
[00:01:53]  And then we had the Fed come out and say, you know what?
[00:01:56]  We're going to make cheap money again.
[00:01:57]  We're going to have rates that are slashed because inflation is not our biggest concern, although.
[00:02:04]  The reality is, there are still some concerns with inflation, but inflation is not our biggest concern.
[00:02:08]  The concern now is that, well, half of America is going to be jobless due to AI and due to this and H 1B visas and blah, blah, blah, blah.
[00:02:17]  So, of course, Wall Street hears that and they're like, yes, cheap labor, AI, artificial intelligence, we're going all in.
[00:02:25]  But what this means for the individual American is that markets might scream higher, but you could be jobless.
[00:02:33]  And that's a really big deal.
[00:02:35]  That said, also markets could come to a screeching halt.
[00:02:39]  We have some important data coming out even this Friday that could give markets a big scare.
[00:02:45]  So, yes, the Fed has signaled that we're going to have three total rate cuts at the end of 2025.
[00:02:50]  We've had one so far in September.
[00:02:52]  Maybe we get October and December, or maybe we get October and November.
[00:02:55]  We'll see.
[00:02:56]  But three rate cuts, 25 basis points is what the market is actually pricing in.
[00:03:01]  Maybe we get a surprise half of a percentage point, 50 basis cut.
[00:03:05]  But ultimately, you're looking at less than a full percentage point, 75 in total.
[00:03:10]  And you're looking at unemployment ticking up.
[00:03:12]  And that's what we're going to talk about today.
[00:03:15]  And the reality is that even with cheap money, if we go into a recession, everything's going to hurt.
[00:03:21]  And the market will eventually respond to that.
[00:03:23]  No matter how cheap the money is, no matter how much globalism there is, how mild the tariffs are, if the average American can't afford to live, and we're already there, but if it becomes exponentially worse because all of a sudden, you know, five and then six and then 10%, maybe even higher, of Americans are unemployed.

=== Early Warning Signs (13:49) ===

[00:03:43]  Then markets will absolutely crash.
[00:03:46]  Now, we are not going, we want to be financially responsible.
[00:03:49]  We're not telling you to buy, sell, or hold.
[00:03:51]  We're not giving financial advice and not telling you what to do.
[00:03:55]  And we're also not predicting with certainty that the market will crash, but we're saying that it's possible.
[00:04:01]  And we want to talk about Christians.
[00:04:03]  How can we be bulletproof?
[00:04:06]  How can we be invulnerable in times like this?
[00:04:09]  We want to not only scrape by, not only survive, but we want to build generational wealth.
[00:04:16]  Why?
[00:04:16]  Because we want to be comfortable and we want to be arrogant.
[00:04:18]  And we want, no, it's not about that.
[00:04:21]  We want to be rich.
[00:04:23]  Being rich is not a sin, it's greed.
[00:04:26]  Right, the love of money that is the root of all kinds of evil.
[00:04:28]  We want to be rich, why for the good of God's people and for His glory, for the good of God's people and for His glory.
[00:04:36]  We want to be good stewards of whatever God has given us because the proverbs say that a wise man, a good man, leaves an inheritance not just for his children but his children's children.
[00:04:46]  And one way to be good stewards is to uh responsibly hedge against disaster, to hedge against market crashes, to hedge against this, to hedge against that.
[00:04:57]  To cast your bread, I think of the Proverbs elsewhere that say seven times upon the water.
[00:05:02]  Meaning what?
[00:05:03]  Don't put all your eggs in one basket, right?
[00:05:05]  Diversify, have many different investments, be wise, because things that seem as though they could never stop.
[00:05:13]  Well, the reality is that human history has taught us again and again that things that appeared to be invincible actually had an Achilles heel.
[00:05:21]  And in the Proverbs of God, in his timing, titans fell, right?
[00:05:25]  Empires crumbled.
[00:05:27]  This has happened time and time and time.
[00:05:29]  Again, so to discuss the market and what you could consider doing, and what we see as a possibility of what might be happening not just in the long, long term, right?
[00:05:40]  The market always goes up and always goes down, but even in the near term, the potential of the market coming down or at least correcting, if not a crash.
[00:05:48]  To talk about these things, what you should do, what we see as a possibility, what might happen in the near future, we are inviting back on the show a special guest, Bill Armour.
[00:05:57]  He's going to be joining us for our two segments in the show.
[00:06:02]  And we will dive right in after this introduction.
[00:06:15]  We're so back, and economically speaking, it might be so over.
[00:06:19]  We'll see.
[00:06:20]  We will see.
[00:06:21]  We are joined right here at the top of the hour with Bill Armour.
[00:06:24]  As I just said, he is one of the representatives of Genesis Gold, but he has a degree in biblical studies.
[00:06:29]  He is a firm, sound Christian man, brother in Christ.
[00:06:33]  He's got, I think, some good insights when it comes to Christians investing and markets as a whole.
[00:06:39]  And so we're going to be talking about the market of what's going on right now with the economy at large and unemployment, all those kinds of things.
[00:06:45]  And then we'll, in the second segment, after our first commercial break, we'll talk about.
[00:06:50]  Potentially wise hedges that Christians can invest in to protect against tumult and turmoil and volatility in the market, which we've already had, but it seems like there could be some more on the horizon.
[00:07:03]  And if you've been following us for a while, you might recognize that Bill was with us last month.
[00:07:09]  And so this is something that's kind of a work in progress, but what we're planning tentatively as of now is having Bill join us once a month.
[00:07:19]  Right.
[00:07:20]  So we're not saying every single live stream or something like that.
[00:07:22]  There's a lot of things to talk about.
[00:07:23]  The economy is just one of them.
[00:07:25]  It matters, but there's a lot of things that matter.
[00:07:27]  But what we're talking about is with three live streams every single week, that's 12 in a month, devoting just one of those once a month to have Bill come on the show and to talk economy, to talk Christian investing, to talk markets, because it matters.
[00:07:42]  We want, first and foremost, for the people who listen to us to be sound Christian men in the faith who are virtuous.
[00:07:49]  But if we can help it, We'd like you not to be beautiful losers.
[00:07:53]  We'd like for you not to be sound Christian men who are virtuous and poor, if we can help it.
[00:07:58]  And so we do want to discuss God's economy and our economy and what we can do to be wise.
[00:08:05]  So, Bill, welcome to the show.
[00:08:06]  If there's anything you want to say to introduce yourself, go for it.
[00:08:10]  Yeah, thanks so much.
[00:08:12]  So glad to be here.
[00:08:13]  It's such a pleasure chatting with you guys, and I enjoyed our previous conversation so much.
[00:08:17]  So, it is great.
[00:08:19]  You guys do phenomenal work.
[00:08:20]  A little bit about myself, just a quick background, and I know you alluded to this.
[00:08:24]  I did eight years in the Army.
[00:08:26]  Military intelligence was my specialty there.
[00:08:28]  So I've got some insight on that side of things that does paint my worldview.
[00:08:33]  And then beyond that, I went on to attend Azusa Pacific University, a Christian school in Southern California, where I studied the Bible, obviously, and Christian ministry, and got into precious metals largely as a response to what I was seeing in the world come 2018, 2019, 2020.
[00:08:49]  So, in understanding the finance and the way that the world is changing is such an invaluable part.
[00:08:55]  Of the way that we live our lives.
[00:08:57]  I think that people tend to forget that money is not just this ethereal thing.
[00:09:01]  It is really a representation of your time, of all of the energy and effort that you've expended.
[00:09:07]  And you get a dollar, put it on your card, something, but there's a way that represents your energy.
[00:09:12]  And so, really, in a sense, when we talk about finances, we're talking about how or where are we putting our time, talents, and energy.
[00:09:19]  And obviously, we want that to be blessed and be fruitful, but also to follow in what the Lord's put in front of us and be.
[00:09:26]  Able to and available to support ministries, et cetera, be charitable.
[00:09:31]  And all of that comes from being diligent with our finances.
[00:09:34]  So, a little about me.
[00:09:36]  Great.
[00:09:36]  So, let's go ahead with this first segment and start it off with US.
[00:09:40]  You have some numbers and some graphs that you want to show.
[00:09:42]  I think it'd be great to just get some of the data out there and then let Bill begin to respond.
[00:09:48]  Sure.
[00:09:48]  Bill, I'm going to go ahead and lead with, I think, really what's been the biggest story in the market this month.
[00:09:53]  And that is the story of the revision to the jobs.
[00:09:56]  The Bureau of Labor and Statistics, BLS, they came out and they said, hey, so between April 2024, so this would have still been during the Biden administration, the last eight months or so, really about till about nine months, from those last eight months of 2024 all the way to April 2025, we actually added about a million less jobs than we initially thought we did.
[00:10:18]  So they went ahead and revised the numbers down 911,000.
[00:10:22]  This was the biggest revision on record.
[00:10:24]  And so what this happens is, The Bureau of Labor and Statistics, they'll estimate for given months, we think we added this many jobs or we lost this many jobs.
[00:10:32]  And those are key vital markers of the health of your economy.
[00:10:35]  If you're adding jobs, people are working, they're generating actual revenue, well, then you have, for the most part, a healthy economy.
[00:10:42]  But if you have an economy where people aren't employed, people aren't working, they're staying unemployed longer, we'll get to that in a minute, then all of a sudden you're saying, whoa, something's wrong here.
[00:10:50]  Companies aren't growing, companies aren't hiring people, people can't find jobs, people can't provide.
[00:10:55]  People that can't provide, they're not going out and spending money.
[00:10:58]  Getting updates to their home, they're not buying new properties, they're not investing.
[00:11:02]  Your economy slows down if people are not working, if people aren't in jobs.
[00:11:06]  And so, in this month, just earlier, September 9th, the Bureau of Labor Statistics had to come out and say, yeah, actually, there was a million less jobs added.
[00:11:13]  And I'm going to actually turn it over to Bill, and I've got some more statistics here specifically on unemployment, on long term unemployment.
[00:11:21]  But this would be, if you could describe it, potentially a canary in the coal mine.
[00:11:25]  Even though, like you said, the market is up, we're actually looking around practically.
[00:11:28]  I know people, they've been out of work for months.
[00:11:30]  There's kind of a saying going around in tech.
[00:11:32]  Hold on to your job if you have it, because if you lose it, you'll be looking at a year to replace it.
[00:11:38]  So, practically, the market can be up.
[00:11:40]  Practically, everything can look good.
[00:11:42]  But then you actually have departments coming in saying, actually, we added less jobs.
[00:11:46]  Actually, this is another one.
[00:11:49]  Long term unemployment is going up.
[00:11:51]  You'll see here on the graph, this is from 2022 to May of this year, 2025.
[00:11:56]  We're at the highest level in three years of individuals remaining unemployed for 27 weeks or more.
[00:12:02]  And so, these seem to be kind of the early warning signs.
[00:12:06]  Hang on, the economy is not actually as healthy as a stock market seems to look.
[00:12:10]  Bill, what do you think about that?
[00:12:13]  Yeah, absolutely.
[00:12:14]  I think that the first thing I would tell everyone and just remind everyone is that the stock market is not, we tend to think of it as that is indicative of the health of a market.
[00:12:24]  But in reality, what you really want out of an economy is people to be able to live what we would probably call the American dream, right?
[00:12:32]  They should be able to go to work, they should be able to provide for a family, they should be able to buy a home.
[00:12:36]  These fundamental pieces of what it means to be American.
[00:12:39]  And those are not reflected necessarily in the price of Apple, right?
[00:12:43]  You know, the stock market, we saw this in COVID during, you know, immediately following COVID when markets were roaring, but people weren't working yet.
[00:12:52]  I mean, things were still shut down.
[00:12:53]  We're still in the middle of, you know, the whole shebang there.
[00:12:57]  So to put it that flatly, to think that just because the SP is higher, that that would mean the economy is sort of short-sighted and narrow-sighted, I would argue.
[00:13:07]  So when we look at the job numbers, you're right, canary in a coal mine is a great way to put it.
[00:13:12]  In that they are indicative that something is going on.
[00:13:16]  And obviously, that's why we're talking about rate cuts.
[00:13:18]  That's why that's on the horizon.
[00:13:19]  But it is interesting.
[00:13:20]  And Trump has been a very loud critic of Jerome Powell about he calls him too late.
[00:13:27]  And I think that now we're seeing evidence that Trump was pretty clearly right on this that absolutely we would have preferred rates to go down a little bit sooner in order to pick up job growth.
[00:13:37]  Fundamentally, when we talk about this, when rates go down, it is cheaper to borrow money.
[00:13:43]  So companies are less restrictive.
[00:13:45]  They're less likely to.
[00:13:46]  Tighten their wallet.
[00:13:47]  And so they want to bring more people on board.
[00:13:49]  They want to grow their company, et cetera, et cetera.
[00:13:51]  But as we're talking around 4% on interest rates, so that needs to come down.
[00:13:57]  But you've got another side of that too, right?
[00:13:59]  We've been battling with this really sticky inflation.
[00:14:01]  So we run into the term maybe you've heard it, maybe you haven't, of stagflation.
[00:14:07]  And that's where you've got sticky inflation.
[00:14:09]  But similarly, at the same time, you've also got a job market that's not really growing.
[00:14:14]  So that lever that the Fed is normally pulling of either lowering or raising interest rates, they're really hamstrung that they don't want to put it one way or the other because both are negative circumstances.
[00:14:25]  And that's where we're starting to find ourselves now with these massive revisions backwards.
[00:14:30]  I've been a proponent for a long time that the job numbers have not been representative of what's really been going on.
[00:14:37]  Every time I feel like I'm Nostradamus in this, that it turns out that, oh, yeah, look, a million jobs.
[00:14:42]  But you could just look at some of the other indicators here to say that this doesn't look like a healthy economy.
[00:14:47]  And now we find ourselves being proven right.
[00:14:50]  So, absolutely, this is indicative that something is coming, companies are tightening.
[00:14:55]  And maybe you see, as far as the market is concerned, that catches up.
[00:14:59]  It does often play catch up to these kinds of things.
[00:15:02]  You've got companies that are expected to grow at multiples of two, three X year over year for 10, 20, 30 years, and that's priced in.
[00:15:09]  And then all of a sudden, money is not as cheap to borrow.
[00:15:11]  And so those prices have to be revised, those expectations have to be revised downwards.
[00:15:16]  And that's where you would see, obviously, the stock prices of those come down and market turnoff.
[00:15:22]  Right.
[00:15:23]  I remember I worked in biotech, it was around 2021, 2022.
[00:15:27]  And speaking of cheap money, well, the rates were so low that companies say they wanted to expand.
[00:15:31]  They wanted to add another plant.
[00:15:32]  They wanted to add another division.
[00:15:34]  They wanted to spend on big products.
[00:15:35]  They wanted to acquire a drug.
[00:15:37]  Well, it was very, very cheap to do so.
[00:15:39]  So they could borrow money at pennies on the dollar.
[00:15:41]  And practically speaking, hey, we threw up this plant.
[00:15:44]  Hey, we added these people.
[00:15:44]  We're able to do all the plans that we want to do.
[00:15:47]  I had to remember hiring being so big.
[00:15:49]  Your departments were full of people.
[00:15:51]  And it was as those rates came up, this is what practically it affects.
[00:15:55]  All of a sudden, companies, smaller, midsize, especially the large ones, Oh, I want to add a plant.
[00:16:00]  Well, this is the millions of dollars it's going to cost me in interest.
[00:16:04]  I want to keep all these employees.
[00:16:05]  Well, practically speaking, this is money that could go to that type of expansion.
[00:16:09]  So, practically speaking, all of a sudden, oh, there's a lot less money going around to pay these people, to build these facilities, to add this product.
[00:16:18]  And personnel is often salaries.
[00:16:20]  That's a big expense that is very quick to get cut when you'd rather do something that you think can make more money.
[00:16:26]  Right.
[00:16:26]  American PAC leader just commented in the chat.
[00:16:29]  He said, I'm in tech.
[00:16:30]  And it's worse than it was in 2008.
[00:16:32]  It's important for people to realize.
[00:16:34]  So, part of the problem is globalism.
[00:16:36]  It's Americans being replaced by Indians and H 1B visas and those kinds of things.
[00:16:42]  And yes, we saw from the Trump administration a little bit of positive news that they were going to actually charge companies $100,000.
[00:16:50]  But initially, it seemed like it's another Trump, classic Trump MO, right?
[00:16:56]  So, it's a bark, and then the bite ends up being a tickle.
[00:17:01]  You know, so it's like it was going to be, you know, what we were told is a hundred thousand dollars annually for each H 1B visa, and then it became a hundred thousand dollars total, and not for any of the ones you know that are already here.
[00:17:13]  But half of India currently lives in America, you know, so only for you know the next 50 million you know that we're going to import, and even then it's a one time cost.
[00:17:22]  And so, uh, yeah, so one, you're being replaced by foreigners, you Americans are absolutely being replaced by foreigners, um, and being replaced at every level, um, in terms of being able to.

=== The AI Bubble Risk (10:40) ===

[00:17:33]  To afford a home, buy a home, but also in terms of jobs.
[00:17:37]  But in addition to that, there is something to be said for AI.
[00:17:42]  I think the verdict's still out.
[00:17:43]  There's a lot of question marks.
[00:17:46]  That's true.
[00:17:48]  I'm not saying this is a fact.
[00:17:49]  I'm just saying that there are some economists out there and not just a few quacks, but some people with legitimacy and credibility who are projecting that eventually, not tomorrow, but eventually, and not 100 years from now either, but in the next, you know, anywhere from 5, 10, 20 years, 20 being max, that upwards of anywhere from, you know, 30 to even 50% of Americans would be replaced with their jobs.
[00:18:16]  And here's the thing I understand, you know, I'm post millennial, I have an optimistic.
[00:18:20]  Outlook on the future.
[00:18:21]  And there's a lot of guys who'll say, no, that'll never happen.
[00:18:24]  The cotton gin, they thought that was going to replace people, but really it just created more jobs.
[00:18:28]  Okay, here's the deal artificial intelligence is a tool.
[00:18:31]  I'm aware.
[00:18:32]  I am aware.
[00:18:33]  And no, I don't think sentience is possible.
[00:18:36]  I don't think that God would allow within the fabric, the rules of the world that He created for us to achieve, to make life, to make human beings essentially.
[00:18:49]  So all AI is, is a very, very, very powerful tool.
[00:18:53]  That's all it is.
[00:18:54]  But it's going to get exponentially more and more powerful.
[00:18:57]  It's never going to truly think.
[00:18:59]  It's never going to have a soul.
[00:19:00]  It's never going to attain sentience.
[00:19:02]  We're not going to be able to upload our conscience to the cloud and create a digital eternal life and those kinds of things.
[00:19:07]  We've talked about that before on the show, and that continues to be our position.
[00:19:12]  However, even within narrow AI, it is still possible that it gets so smart and so fast and so effective that you actually can replace a lot of human workers.
[00:19:24]  And when it comes, To the cotton gin or the steam engine, or these kinds of things in the past.
[00:19:28]  It's like, well, yeah, but you'll never replace people.
[00:19:31]  Okay, well, here's the deal.
[00:19:33]  And I've said this before, I'm going to say it again.
[00:19:35]  In the case of AI, you're not just talking about digital AI, but you're talking about robots, right?
[00:19:41]  You're talking about Optimus.
[00:19:43]  You're talking, there's not just Tesla, there's multiple different companies, Serv, all these companies that are working on physical robots.
[00:19:49]  And some of these robots are not just like the cotton gin.
[00:19:52]  It's not just a tool like a hammer or a screwdriver.
[00:19:55]  It's like, yes, it is a tool.
[00:19:58]  But what What do you think happens if a tool gets invented that is shaped exactly like and has the same mobility and function, physical function of a human being?
[00:20:11]  Right?
[00:20:11]  So it's like you make more tools, and it's like, well, then people can use those tools and we can just produce even more.
[00:20:20]  Okay, but what do you do if you get to a point where half of your country is simply not qualified to work anymore?
[00:20:29]  And it's never going to be.
[00:20:30]  Think about all the lawfare.
[00:20:32]  Right, so there'll be people who you know they'll be fighting for you know labor unions and things like this.
[00:20:36]  And but the corporations they're not going to say, well, pennies on the dollar, you know, bottom line must go up, GDP that won't be the argument.
[00:20:44]  They will hire the best lawyers and they will make human moral arguments.
[00:20:48]  They'll say, hey, well, can we really afford the margin of error and the casualties that occur from human truck drivers?
[00:20:55]  This many people die in America every single year because of car accidents, and you know, it's not that we're just trying to make a buck, but having automated you know trucks driving with artificial intelligence.
[00:21:06]  Here's the metrics, here's the stats, here's the numbers.
[00:21:08]  We'll save 30,000 lives in terms of car accidents per year.
[00:21:12]  Really, you know, we can't afford to have human drivers, not because of their paycheck, but because human life is just so precious.
[00:21:19]  And then what happens is you save 30,000 lives in terms of car accidents, but you have 30 million people who don't have a job.
[00:21:26]  I think that that's possible.
[00:21:27]  So my point is yes, on one hand, Americans are being replaced by foreigners.
[00:21:31]  So there's the globalism H1B problem, but there also is the AI problem.
[00:21:36]  And I'm not completely against AI.
[00:21:38]  I'm also certainly not for it.
[00:21:40]  I have hopes and dreams, and I have also massive concerns.
[00:21:44]  But the point is this there is a multifaceted, multiple front war right now when it comes to heritage Americans having a vocation.
[00:21:55]  And if you think that that's just fluff, that's just scare tactics, fear mongering, that there's no substance to that, then I think you're being naive.
[00:22:06]  What do you guys think?
[00:22:08]  Yeah, I would echo that sentiment.
[00:22:10]  I think that it's.
[00:22:12]  One way I tend to think about AI in particular is that if AI at its worst here, let's say it gets to the point where it's able to do the mundane task of some researcher at a college doing some sort of general research, but the worst one there at the worst college.
[00:22:30]  But because they're automatic, they can do a thousand years of that in a few days.
[00:22:36]  So the production, right, it is exponential when we talk about this.
[00:22:41]  So people do talk about it, I'm not saying it's coming tomorrow.
[00:22:44]  But I do think that when it does come, it will surprise people at how quickly it does come.
[00:22:49]  Because again, that exponential growth in AI will be dramatic.
[00:22:53]  And I also think on the flip side, now, some of that is hopeful.
[00:22:57]  That's why you see these multiples on any of these AI companies being so dramatic, is because they are hopeful that it'll come sooner than later.
[00:23:04]  I don't think we're necessarily right on the doorstep of that.
[00:23:08]  I think the more pressing concerns are things like the H1B1 visas and things like that.
[00:23:12]  But at the end of the day, this does happen.
[00:23:15]  Is that in a year?
[00:23:16]  Is it in five years?
[00:23:17]  10 years?
[00:23:18]  You know, who's to say no one has a crystal ball?
[00:23:20]  But I really agree with the sentiment there that if you don't think it can happen or will happen, then I think that's naive.
[00:23:28]  Now, we can argue about when that does occur.
[00:23:32]  But to understand that a lot of this is, and I think that from the top down, you're right, it will become a if they'll argue in a way that doesn't seem like it's just at its bottom dollar, but they will get there.
[00:23:43]  And the lobbying in this country is so powerful.
[00:23:46]  I don't think that general trade unions and whatnot are going to stand up.
[00:23:50]  To the tremendous wealth that can be created by replacing people.
[00:23:53]  So, if they can move, I mean, that really is the end goal, right?
[00:23:57]  They put people into multi family housing, control rent, you never own.
[00:24:01]  These are all pieces of the puzzle here.
[00:24:04]  Take away skills that you may have had so that you're forced to fall into line, get paid whatever they think you're worth because you don't really have any traction or say so because the job that you used to do has been automated in some way or form.
[00:24:17]  So, I think it's a scary concept, but it's one that we have to be.
[00:24:21]  Honest about and have these conversations so that people aren't thrown for a ride when it does come.
[00:24:27]  Yeah.
[00:24:29]  So basically, I'll put my cards on the table and make a prediction.
[00:24:33]  Again, this is not financial advice.
[00:24:35]  I'm not telling you what to do.
[00:24:36]  I'm fallible.
[00:24:36]  I don't have a crystal ball.
[00:24:37]  I could be absolutely wrong.
[00:24:40]  But what I see is this I don't think that we're at the point like the dot com bubble where every single company, we have a website, we have a website, we have a website.
[00:24:51]  You know, I there is some overlap, some similarity with that, where every single company is like, We use AI.
[00:24:58]  It's like, okay, yeah, well, my wife uses AI.
[00:25:01]  You know, like, um, you know, everybody I've been using AI for, you know, over a decade every single time I use, you know, Google Maps.
[00:25:09]  And so, I mean, that that is, you know, it's not as developed as Chat GPT, but that's what it was.
[00:25:15]  Um, so, so I do think there's some overlap when you think of the dot com bubble and the AI bubble.
[00:25:22]  That said, there's a lot of guys saying the bubble's going to burst tomorrow.
[00:25:25]  I don't think we're there.
[00:25:26]  I think it's going to be a little while.
[00:25:28]  However, at minimum, though, my personal prediction, again, not financial advice, is that we have been screaming in the markets.
[00:25:38]  So, September is historically, you look at the last 100 years in the stock market, historically, September is the worst month of the year.
[00:25:46]  And it has been arguably one of the best months, if not the best month of 2025.
[00:25:53]  September was just, you know, roaring.
[00:25:56]  And a big part of that is because the market was pricing in and correctly that we were going to get rate cuts.
[00:26:03]  And so, you know, the market likes cheap money.
[00:26:06]  And so we got that.
[00:26:07]  But to think that we would somehow skip.
[00:26:10]  Your typical pullback and cooling off that happens in September, or even a correction, 5%, 6%, to think that we would just skip that entirely and that that wouldn't happen this year at all and that it would just be the tariff scare back in April and just up, with no dips along the way till the end of the year, I think is a bit naive.
[00:26:29]  So I'm not necessarily saying there's going to be a crash this year.
[00:26:34]  I don't predict that.
[00:26:35]  But I do think that we'll probably have an end of the year rally like we did in 2020 and 2021 and 2024.
[00:26:42]  Um, but sometime before, um, you know, between now and this kind of end of the year rally that could be November, it could just be December, um, I do think that you're going to have somewhat of a correction.
[00:26:53]  It may not be in the technical sense, five percent full correction, uh, but I do think that markets will likely ease, and um, and I would not be surprised if that happens soon.
[00:27:04]  And in terms of a full blown crash, you know, who knows?
[00:27:08]  Nobody knows.
[00:27:08]  I don't know.
[00:27:09]  I'm not going to pretend to know, um, but but I will say that, um, Even if all these, you know, Mondo companies have cheap labor and have all this AI working for them and are doing this and doing that and producing robots and producing all these different things of immense value, if Americans, the people, are unemployed, then there will be a significant economic turmoil.
[00:27:38]  And I do think that there are, like you said, a canary in the coal mine.
[00:27:42]  I think there are the beginning signs of that.
[00:27:44]  And Christians should be.
[00:27:46]  Prepared.
[00:27:46]  So let's go to our first commercial break and then we're going to come back and we'll give a little bit more data.
[00:27:51]  Wes has some more data, but we'll also talk about in light of a potential economic downturn, whether that's next week or whether that's next year or whether that's a couple years from now, in light of potential economic downturn, how can Christians be good stewards and wisely hedge against it?
[00:28:11]  So here's our first commercial break.

=== Securing Retirement Assets (04:14) ===

[00:28:13]  The danger of centralized power is often represented by the word king.
[00:28:18]  As Americans, we hate the word king.
[00:28:22]  Civilian ownership of body armor is about helping people to have increased power to resist tyrants and criminals.
[00:28:30]  And so Armored Republic is about helping you to preserve your God-given rights to the honor of the Lord Jesus Christ because he is the King of Kings and he governs kings and he will judge them.
[00:28:43]  This is Armored Republic and in a republic there is no king but Christ.
[00:28:49]  We are free craftsmen and we are honored to be your armor spread choice.
[00:29:06]  The silver is mine and the gold is mine, declares the Lord of Hosts.
[00:29:11]  Yet your retirement dollars keep shrinking daily as Washington prints money out of thin air.
[00:29:19]  Genesis Gold Group aligns financial guidance with godly principles when others serve only profit.
[00:29:26]  Their faith centered approach to gold IRAs stands apart in an industry that has forgotten what true stewardship actually means.
[00:29:36]  Why gamble your family's future on Wall Street's paper promises?
[00:29:41]  Your 401k and IRA deserve better protection.
[00:29:46]  Genesis Gold Group transforms your vulnerable retirement accounts into physical gold, something real, something tangible, something that God created with inherent value.
[00:29:58]  Their faith driven experts walk you through every step, helping you shield your life's work from the financial storms up ahead.
[00:30:07]  No high pressure tactics, no hidden fees, just guidance rooted in timeless principles of sound.
[00:30:14]  Stewardship.
[00:30:15]  So the decision is simple.
[00:30:17]  Watch your retirement evaporate through inflation or secure it in God's precious metal.
[00:30:24]  Take action now.
[00:30:25]  Go and visit Right Response Bible Gold.com.
[00:30:30]  You can visit today for your free book, The Bible and Gold, and join the thousands of believers who sleep soundly knowing their future is anchored in something unshakable.
[00:30:41]  Again, that's Right Response Bible Gold.com.
[00:30:46]  Safeguarding your legacy with God's timeless treasure.
[00:30:52]  When it comes to your financial future, are you planning forward or backwards from your desired results?
[00:30:58]  What type of financial culture do you want to create for your family and for your children's children?
[00:31:05]  We are not called to be wise as doves.
[00:31:08]  Therefore, simpleton planning simply won't cut it.
[00:31:12]  Joe Garrison helps families develop and implement a long term culture of excellent financial management.
[00:31:19]  He starts with your goals, your tithing plan, your retirement, and the legacy that you want to build for your generations.
[00:31:28]  And then he works backwards to build a real actionable plan to get your family on track.
[00:31:35]  Now, many of my personal friends have benefited from the financial wisdom of Joe Garrison that he's shared for their specific situations.
[00:31:44]  Do you want to work with someone who strives for alpha with your investing, hates taxes, and brokers insurance?
[00:31:52]  Start planning smart.
[00:31:54]  Call Joe Garresey at 615 767 2555.
[00:32:01]  Again, that's 615 767 2555.
[00:32:08]  Or you can find him by going to backwardsplanningfinancial.nm.com.
[00:32:16]  Again, that's backwardsplanningfinancial.nn, as in Nancy, m, as in Ministries.com.

=== Bitcoin vs Dollar Strength (15:15) ===

[00:32:28]  I'm not going to lie.
[00:32:29]  The music to that last commercial pumps me up.
[00:32:32]  It reminds me of like my 12 year old self playing Sonic the Hedgehog.
[00:32:36]  Sega.
[00:32:38]  All right, we're back.
[00:32:39]  Let's go over a little bit more data.
[00:32:41]  Wes has a couple more charts.
[00:32:42]  We love a good chart.
[00:32:43]  Chart saves lives.
[00:32:44]  It saved Donald Trump.
[00:32:45]  So let's look at a couple more charts, respond to that.
[00:32:47]  And then let's talk about Christian investment strategies to hedge against economic downturn.
[00:32:54]  So I'll give it to Bill just after one piece of data here.
[00:32:57]  Here's.
[00:32:57]  Everything we're saying, hey, is the market about to crash?
[00:32:59]  What are we looking at?
[00:33:01]  As far as job goes, and I can't think of anything that practically impacts husbands and fathers more, but as far as jobs and unemployment, October 3rd, the job numbers for September are going to come out.
[00:33:10]  You look at this chart that's on the screen, I'll describe it if you're listening.
[00:33:13]  You'll see towards the end of the year, kind of from August afterwards on, a growth in jobs added.
[00:33:18]  This reflecting of the holiday season, increased spending.
[00:33:21]  So for 2023 and 2024, September has been a big month.
[00:33:25]  August has been bigger as well, typically than this August has been.
[00:33:29]  But you're going to see if things are doing okay, hopefully.
[00:33:33]  A big jump.
[00:33:34]  You're going to see going into September, then October, and November, hopefully see that same increase close to 300,000 jobs being added.
[00:33:42]  However, if on October 3rd, job numbers come out and we continue the trend, we had a negative job ad.
[00:33:47]  This was back in May, negative job ad in May, very low for August or June, actually, July.
[00:33:54]  If you're looking at August, very low ad.
[00:33:56]  If that trend continues, we're in trouble.
[00:33:58]  And so, kind of pin in your calendar, job numbers will come out again for September on October 3rd.
[00:34:03]  That's your metric to try to get a sense.
[00:34:05]  Hey, was this job thing we're trying to get out of the Biden administration?
[00:34:09]  They were fudging some numbers.
[00:34:10]  Things are okay.
[00:34:11]  Americans are getting jobs.
[00:34:13]  Or are the numbers not kind of lying?
[00:34:15]  We're seeing like, oh snap.
[00:34:17]  Practically speaking, people are not employed.
[00:34:20]  We're not growing and we've got economic pain ahead.
[00:34:22]  So, oh snap.
[00:34:23]  So well said.
[00:34:25]  Oh snap.
[00:34:25]  Oh snap.
[00:34:26]  So true, King.
[00:34:27]  Bill, what do you think?
[00:34:29]  Yeah.
[00:34:29]  So, my first just take there and point would be that anything that happens with these numbers that come out from VLS.
[00:34:37]  We always need to keep in mind that as results come in, so as job numbers come in from places like ADP, they don't get them immediately.
[00:34:45]  And it's why they're constantly revising them backwards, forwards, et cetera.
[00:34:48]  And I'm sure there's some gamesmanship to that.
[00:34:51]  And that's a whole other conversation.
[00:34:52]  But what I will say is that whatever number we get, we can pretty much guarantee that's not the number we end up with.
[00:34:58]  So whether that's high, low, it still leaves questions moving forward.
[00:35:02]  That's the first piece I would say.
[00:35:04]  The second piece I would mention is that.
[00:35:09]  Rate changes don't have effects immediately, necessarily, some effect, but largely the effects come over time.
[00:35:16]  And so it's kind of like the old saying there an object in motion tends to stay in motion.
[00:35:21]  And what I mean by that is that when we cut rates, the implication we would want to create job growth, et cetera, but that's much harder to do if we've already stagnated than if we're already growing or on the right track.
[00:35:33]  So if we have reached a point where job growth has stagnated, which I think looking at these numbers, we've been moving in that direction.
[00:35:40]  For the last year or so, we just maybe haven't known that those numbers haven't been properly reported, but that we are at a point now where that job growth, we're in stagflation.
[00:35:49]  So to think that it could just overnight we could fix the problem by lowering rates is really not, it doesn't coalesce with what history would tell us about this.
[00:35:58]  So even if we get great numbers and they pop right back up, one, we might want to question those numbers, just based on people you know, what you see around, because you may, in fact, those numbers may come back two months later and not be accurate.
[00:36:12]  And two, We would understand that if they are in fact as bad as it seems like they have been, that we may be in for a longer recovery on this.
[00:36:19]  And that kind of ties into these expectations of stock market growth that it may not be as simple as, you know, hey, hit the button and things are going, we're off to the races, stocks are back up.
[00:36:32]  Stock market SP is up about 13% or so on the year, which is, I mean, great.
[00:36:36]  No one's crying about a 13% gain.
[00:36:39]  But that is built in with the assumption that inflation's coming down, job growth was still high.
[00:36:44]  If it turns out that jobs are shrinking, companies are shrinking, and we've still got this sticky inflation, now we've got a different conversation about the expectation of equities moving forward.
[00:36:56]  Yeah, well said.
[00:36:57]  What do you think, Wes?
[00:36:59]  Yeah, we can turn it over, I think, specifically to inflation because that's practically if jobs are impacting how do I make money?
[00:37:05]  Inflation is the question of what is actually being done with that money.
[00:37:09]  And if you look at this graph, so inflation.
[00:37:11]  Look at this photograph.
[00:37:13]  Look at it.
[00:37:15]  Through Trump's first admin, we got to be honest, one of the strong points was the economy.
[00:37:19]  The unemployment numbers were good.
[00:37:21]  As far as inflation goes, it was perfectly manageable.
[00:37:23]  Until Fauci killed it.
[00:37:24]  Until Fauci killed it.
[00:37:26]  Until China, the Wu flu, the Chinese flu.
[00:37:29]  So then you see here, this is your whole graph of really, I mean, everything.
[00:37:32]  That the Fed has been trying to get their hands on for the last four years.
[00:37:35]  It's this runaway inflation, even excluding food and energy.
[00:37:39]  I mean, at the peak, you're talking six and a half percent inflation.
[00:37:42]  Your money just literally in the course of a year, just losing value.
[00:37:46]  Yep.
[00:37:47]  You got six percent demotion if you do got no rates.
[00:37:49]  That's right.
[00:37:50]  Well, I made a hundred thousand dollars.
[00:37:51]  Congratulations in real terms, excluding food and energy, if we include them even higher, you got a 10 percent pay cut.
[00:37:59]  So the point is, even compared to before this huge runaway from COVID, we're still at three percent.
[00:38:05]  So, practically speaking, how do I take money?
[00:38:08]  So, I'm making it in cash, I'm making it in the US dollar.
[00:38:11]  That dollar is losing 3% every year.
[00:38:15]  That money.
[00:38:16]  And that's why Christians, you have to think like it's not just, well, I'm going to store, I have cash here and I can store it in this and I can store it in that or I can store it here.
[00:38:25]  That money itself is quickly being eroded away.
[00:38:27]  And I would say, even from the outset, it's actually an immoral system.
[00:38:31]  It's immoral that money that you have and you earned that had a certain set dollar with a certain expectation of the labor that went into it that someone far away could go.
[00:38:39]  Let's print a couple billion more of these because scarcity is a huge aspect of value.
[00:38:44]  There is a reason dirt is not sold, it's everywhere.
[00:38:47]  Scarcity is what drives, at some level, of course, divisibility, interchangeability, all of those other things.
[00:38:53]  But scarcity is a big one.
[00:38:54]  And so, you practically, if you're storing your wealth in the US dollar, 3% still, not just like, well, a couple years ago, no, it was even worse then.
[00:39:02]  Still today, and rates are coming down, still today, 3%, you're taking a pay cut every single year and practically.
[00:39:10]  What it is that your money can buy?
[00:39:13]  I think of it like this.
[00:39:14]  So, used to, when I was younger, I thought, all right, I have money.
[00:39:18]  What should I invest it in?
[00:39:20]  And now, the way I think about it is I have wealth that God's given me.
[00:39:24]  And what should I invest it in?
[00:39:25]  And money, or more particularly, U.S. currency, is just one investment.
[00:39:31]  So, it's not I have the U.S. dollar, this many dollars.
[00:39:36]  What should I invest my dollars in?
[00:39:38]  No, I have wealth, the accumulation of my time and talents and treasure, my My energy and what should I invest that in?
[00:39:47]  And the US dollar is an investment in and of itself.
[00:39:51]  So it's not, I have money.
[00:39:54]  Do I do stocks or bonds or gold?
[00:39:56]  No, it's I have wealth and I can do stocks or bonds or gold or crypto or the US dollar.
[00:40:03]  And when you think of it like that, the US dollar currency money actually as an investment, then the next question that that immediately raises is is it a good investment?
[00:40:13]  And the answer is, Absolutely not.
[00:40:16]  In fact, it's one of the only investments that historically always goes down, always goes down.
[00:40:24]  It's a depreciating investment, always.
[00:40:27]  So that doesn't mean you don't hold any cash because emergencies happen, right?
[00:40:32]  And there can be penalties for liquidating investments and those kinds of things.
[00:40:35]  So I'm not saying that you should be foolish.
[00:40:38]  It's good to have some money on hand for a kid who breaks a leg and you got to go to the emergency room, you know, or whatever it may be.
[00:40:45]  So, having some cash on hand, yes.
[00:40:49]  But if you're a wealthy individual or just even an average individual, to have 90% of your wealth in cash, knowing that in terms of inflation, it's taking up.
[00:41:01]  Imagine that you have cash and you've stored it, locked it away in a room, and there are literal live moths in that room.
[00:41:11]  And you can see through a glass window that every year you have $100 in there and they're eating up six of those dollars.
[00:41:18]  Like, would you think that's wise?
[00:41:20]  Hey, I should put another $100 in there.
[00:41:22]  Of course not.
[00:41:23]  So you have to think of it's not money which investment, it's wealth which investment, and money is one of those investments.
[00:41:31]  And it happens to be a bad one, happens to be a bad one.
[00:41:34]  So keeping some money on hand for emergencies.
[00:41:37]  But for the rest of your wealth, and I would argue 50% or more of your wealth, depending how much money you have, to be in something besides currency, besides the US dollar.
[00:41:49]  To be in some kind of investment, some stocks, some bonds, some precious metals, maybe some crypto.
[00:41:55]  I do think, I gotta admit, I think that Bitcoin and Ethereum, all right, I'm not talking about Fartcoin 2000, you know, whatever.
[00:42:03]  But Bitcoin and Ethereum have been lagging in terms of the four year cycle that follows the halving and those kinds of things historically all the way back, you know, 2012.
[00:42:13]  They have been lagging, but Bitcoin, one of its fundamental support lines with this cycle has been 112,000.
[00:42:22]  And it looked like it was going to break and fall through, but it's held.
[00:42:26]  And I would not be surprised if by, you know, between now and the end of the year, it's probably not going to be tomorrow, probably be right there towards the end of the year, November.
[00:42:34]  Most likely, if I had a guess, probably around Christmas time, I do think that Bitcoin will run.
[00:42:38]  I recently, last month, when Bill came on, I think I projected, you know, 168K.
[00:42:43]  Bill said around 170K.
[00:42:45]  And again, not financial advice, but just us having a little fun, doing a little prediction.
[00:42:50]  I would like to revise my prediction 200K.
[00:42:54]  I think it's going to roar.
[00:42:55]  I think it's going to roar.
[00:42:56]  And it's like, Joel, you came up with that on your own.
[00:42:58]  No, I listened to Tom Lee from Fun Strat.
[00:43:01]  And honestly, I mean, the dude is incurably bullish.
[00:43:05]  So sometimes it's hard to take what he says seriously because.
[00:43:08]  Two RPs in the pod, though.
[00:43:09]  Yeah, I mean, no matter what's happening, he's like, it's going up.
[00:43:14]  But the way he says it, I say, it's going up.
[00:43:17]  And he says, as an Asian man who knows math, it's going up.
[00:43:21]  And when he says it, it carries more weight.
[00:43:23]  And he says it very eloquently and with lots of big words.
[00:43:26]  And so I do think that crypto.
[00:43:29]  Has some life in it with Q4 if we don't have a big macro downturn in markets, because crypto still has not completely distinguished itself from the market, right?
[00:43:39]  I mean, Bitcoin should be like digital gold, which would be in many ways not just an investment, but a hedge, but it has not distinguished itself.
[00:43:48]  It doesn't have the history that gold and silver and precious metals do.
[00:43:52]  So when the market downturns, gold will probably go down a little bit, but then a lot of people will move money over to gold.
[00:43:59]  And so it can actually diverge from stocks and do well.
[00:44:03]  Whereas Bitcoin doesn't, it hasn't completely solidified that reputation as digital gold and a hedge.
[00:44:09]  And so Bitcoin is going to still follow the market in many ways, or at least maybe not follow it parallel, but follow it behind.
[00:44:17]  So we've had a market roar.
[00:44:18]  And that's why I think Bitcoin, that's kind of been sitting there at that 110 to 120,000 range, will follow what's happened in like August and September with the market and Q4, probably roar, barring any catastrophic circumstances.
[00:44:32]  But my point is, if we have a recession or something severe, Bitcoin is not going to distinguish itself.
[00:44:41]  And the market is crashing and Bitcoin is soaring.
[00:44:43]  That's not going to happen, it's going to follow suit.
[00:44:47]  So I think crypto is a good investment.
[00:44:50]  I think stocks within reason, especially for long term investments, is a good investment.
[00:44:55]  Bonds at times can be a good investment.
[00:44:56]  Real estate, I think, is a good investment, especially, you know, there's no bad real estate investment if you plan to stay a while.
[00:45:03]  So I think those things are good.
[00:45:05]  But I also think with economic turmoil and with us kind of, you know, we talked about the fourth turning the other day, with us kind of really historically entering into uncharted territory, I think that another good investment is precious metals.
[00:45:20]  And that is an expertise of bills.
[00:45:23]  Bill, could you talk to us about precious metals and gold?
[00:45:28]  Sure, sure.
[00:45:28]  Happy to.
[00:45:28]  And actually, just a couple numbers that came to mind as you were chatting.
[00:45:32]  So, you talk about kind of the bull run that the stock market is on.
[00:45:36]  Some historical context here the Dow to gold ratio today is about 10.5 to 1.
[00:45:42]  So, the price of the Dow basically to one ounce of gold.
[00:45:46]  In about 1980, it fell below.
[00:45:48]  So, one ounce of gold is worth more than one to one.
[00:45:51]  So, to paint a picture of what it looks like, you know, This since about the 1980s.
[00:45:55]  And there's reasons for that.
[00:45:57]  Some of that is even just the functionality of even something like the 401k system that has funneled investments into people didn't have as many choices, right?
[00:46:06]  The only options they had were stocks, bonds, mutual funds, et cetera.
[00:46:09]  So there was a forced sort of paper funnel that put people's retirement savings into the market.
[00:46:18]  And so you've seen this divergence between the price of gold and the price of the market.
[00:46:23]  Now, obviously, if that were to just split in half, let's say.
[00:46:26]  Half of the money, people woke up and said, We used to actually prefer one ounce of gold over one share of the Dow, but now we're going to change that.
[00:46:34]  We're going to split that in half.
[00:46:35]  So from 10 and a half to five, that's where you see gold at about 7,000 to 8,000.
[00:46:39]  And then obviously with Trump, for people who don't know, Trump has passed legislation allowing people to own.
[00:46:44]  And still, we're talking about paper gold and silver.
[00:46:46]  So there's some ickiness in there, and that's a whole other conversation.
[00:46:50]  But nonetheless, it does still drive the price of physical metals a little bit.
[00:46:53]  But he's laid that to be.
[00:46:56]  Mandated that that be accessible for people through 401ks, even as they're still working, even as they're under 59 and a half.
[00:47:02]  So that's a huge deal.
[00:47:04]  Yeah, it's a huge deal.
[00:47:05]  You add trillions of dollars of potential investments.
[00:47:08]  And a lot of people I talk to that are around my age that can't access that money say, I'd love to have gold or silver or crypto, et cetera, these alternative assets beyond just stocks and bonds, but I'm just not able to.
[00:47:21]  My plan doesn't allow that.
[00:47:22]  And so changing that, I think you're going to see a dramatic shift in the price of these alternative assets if for no other reason than people have access to them and put You know, a majority of their savings, most Americans' savings is inside of a retirement account like that.
[00:47:35]  So, you know, the Dow to gold piece I think is important.
[00:47:39]  That's real quick to summarize you, Bill, just for the listener.

=== Wise Gold Investments (15:19) ===

[00:47:44]  It sounds like what you're saying is that, like, yes, gold has done really well in 2025.
[00:47:49]  So gold is soaring, but that's in the micro.
[00:47:52]  If we pan out and we look at the last 30, 35 years, all the way back to 1980, what you were saying comparing, you know, gold with the Dow, it sounds like what you're saying is in the micro, gold is soaring.
[00:48:01]  But in the macro, the big picture, Gold is lagging behind.
[00:48:05]  In other words, there's some massive potential upside.
[00:48:08]  It has a lot of room that it could run without rainbows and unicorns, like in a realistic projection.
[00:48:18]  Nobody has a crystal ball.
[00:48:19]  Again, not financial advice, but gold, what is it right now?
[00:48:23]  It's like about $3,750, give or take $20, depending on the moment.
[00:48:29]  Say it again $3,000, what?
[00:48:30]  $3,570.
[00:48:32]  Okay, so $3,736.
[00:48:36]  Okay, so $3,700.
[00:48:37]  So let's say that gold is at $3,700.
[00:48:39]  I remember last year when we were talking, You said that it's reasonable.
[00:48:42]  Again, not saying this will happen, but it is a reasonable prediction that gold could finish this year at 5,000.
[00:48:50]  But the reality is that it could have a run.
[00:48:54]  It is possible it could be 5,000, but it could have a run and even top that.
[00:48:58]  Or in 2026, perhaps, if we give it more time, gold could be 7,000 within the next few months to 18 months or something like that.
[00:49:08]  So we're talking about not just a good investment in terms of God's economy.
[00:49:12]  We talked about that last time.
[00:49:13]  We gave some of the biblical theology of.
[00:49:15]  You have gold in the book of Genesis.
[00:49:16]  You also have it in the book of Revelation.
[00:49:17]  You weren't with us, Wes, but Bill was pointing things out, and then I was having epiphanies based off of what he was saying.
[00:49:23]  And I was thinking about even in God's economy, the infinite one, right?
[00:49:27]  He has no scarcity, no lack.
[00:49:29]  But even for the infinite one, gold is even in the eschaton.
[00:49:33]  The streets are made with gold, which means even in eternity, when there is no lack, gold still has a store of value.
[00:49:39]  That God still sees gold as that.
[00:49:41]  So that's really crazy when you think of all the biblical references to gold, but not just that they're all in the book of Isaiah, but it's.
[00:49:48]  Throughout the whole Bible, from the very beginning of creation and even in the life to come, from Genesis to Revelation, in God's economy, gold is always viewed as valuable.
[00:49:58]  So, in the macro long run, we know that precious metals are a good investment.
[00:50:01]  But my point is to say that even in the short run, we could see gold go on a tear.
[00:50:07]  It's possible that you could have a 40, 50% increase by the end of this year.
[00:50:11]  And it's possible that gold could 2X from here or close to it from the next six to 18 months.
[00:50:17]  Is that fair, Bill?
[00:50:19]  Yeah, absolutely.
[00:50:20]  And another thing I would point out, just because we were talking about inflation, when I always go back to it, is, and there's many different ways to measure money supply.
[00:50:29]  M2 is maybe the most common.
[00:50:30]  And just for people who are listening and may not know what that is, that is going to be the amount of not necessarily cash, but cash equivalents.
[00:50:37]  So what is in checking accounts, what is in savings accounts, actual cash, et cetera.
[00:50:42]  So really immediately liquid cash or cash equivalents has grown about roughly 700% since about the 1980s.
[00:50:51]  So obviously, when we leave the The gold standard there.
[00:50:54]  And gold has not necessarily tracked that perfectly, which means, again, that there's the understanding that gold can very comfortably move.
[00:51:03]  If gold were to move in accordance with that, that's where we're talking about gold at about 7,000, 8,000.
[00:51:09]  More context, even just CPI, if it were to follow the CPI perfectly, you could see gold at 4,500 to 5,000 from about 1980 to now.
[00:51:19]  So, versus the highs, I should say, in 1980.
[00:51:21]  So, all of that to say is that when I talk about these numbers about gold, sometimes people Can think that I am being really pie in the sky and that this is really hopeful.
[00:51:31]  And it's really not.
[00:51:32]  In fact, gold has just been tremendously undervalued for so long that when people look at year to date on gold, they say gold's up 44% year to date.
[00:51:41]  They say, man, that's crazy.
[00:51:42]  How is that possible?
[00:51:43]  And the answer is that we are in the middle of a renaissance in which gold will likely come back to where it sort of belongs.
[00:51:51]  And that's some of these other numbers I've talked about.
[00:51:53]  Now, am I saying it's going to go to 20,000 or something like that?
[00:51:57]  Yes, yes, yes, he is.
[00:52:00]  No, I'm just kidding.
[00:52:01]  No, he's not.
[00:52:03]  Go ahead.
[00:52:04]  I try to be constructive in helping people to understand the historicity of gold in relation to its price and price targets because these are not, you know, abnormal things.
[00:52:14]  It's really just gold has been so depressed for so long because, you know, I mean, the stock market, we've been on the longest and largest bull run in history with the exception of a quick, a couple quick recessions like 2020.
[00:52:25]  But we get out of them so quick because what do we do?
[00:52:28]  We pump money into the system, we, you know, turn away from this, and then all of a sudden we act like it's fine.
[00:52:33]  But at some point, that try and true solution of creating dollars out of nothing.
[00:52:39]  It loses efficacy and doesn't work, and in fact, makes the problem worse.
[00:52:43]  So it's a short term, it's a band aid on a bullet hole.
[00:52:46]  It works short term, but in the long term, you really need surgery or a tourniquet or something that's going to change that.
[00:52:52]  Otherwise, the bleeding will continue.
[00:52:54]  What do you like better right now?
[00:52:57]  Bill Harris is in our chat and just pointing out that silver also has a lot of upside right now and might even be, he's arguing, it might even be potentially a better investment at this current juncture than gold.
[00:53:10]  What do you personally like better right now at this moment?
[00:53:14]  Gold, if you had a thousand bucks, you were going to put it in silver or gold, you only could choose one.
[00:53:19]  What would you go with?
[00:53:21]  Yeah, so I'll start by answering the question that's silver, and now I'll explain.
[00:53:24]  So I always talk with people about gold because they know gold, they understand gold.
[00:53:29]  And functionally, precious metals, I think that does a better job of telling the story.
[00:53:33]  But if you're looking for what has the best expected returns, the way to think of gold and silver is that they historically are tied to one another.
[00:53:42]  And I mean, in a sense of a ratio of a certain amount of silver should roughly equal a certain amount of gold.
[00:53:48]  And that's a gold to silver ratio.
[00:53:50]  And normally, when we look throughout history, we see somewhere in the range of it's higher or lower, depending on when you're looking.
[00:53:55]  But kind of the median there would be about 35 ounces of silver to one ounce of gold.
[00:54:00]  So obviously, gold at about $37.50 right now and silver at about $44.
[00:54:07]  So there's a pretty big discrepancy.
[00:54:08]  We're looking at, you know, 80, 85 to one as opposed to that 35 to one.
[00:54:12]  So let's say that gold decided, you know what, I don't like what Bill's saying.
[00:54:16]  I'm just going to hang out right where I'm at and I'm not going to move an inch.
[00:54:19]  We're still silver, just to fall into that path there where it aligns more directly with its historical relation to gold, it still would have to triple.
[00:54:29]  So, silver, of course, the upside on silver is much more dramatic.
[00:54:33]  I mean, in a perfect world, gold goes to 7,000 and silver falls up to 350.
[00:54:40]  Who knows?
[00:54:40]  But the point is that all the technicals aside, in terms of Of what gold could do, silver alone has a tremendous value.
[00:54:49]  And that's to say nothing of the fundamental pieces that we could talk about silver with the updates and the EV battery coming out of Samsung that will be about one kilo of silver per battery.
[00:55:02]  Do your own research on that, please.
[00:55:03]  I think it's a tremendous product, but that I do believe will replace the lithium ion battery entirely.
[00:55:09]  So there's a lot to say about silver.
[00:55:10]  So I would say silver.
[00:55:12]  I rambled a bit there.
[00:55:13]  No, that was fascinating.
[00:55:15]  I like that.
[00:55:15]  Uh, real quick, uh, because I want to get to our super chats.
[00:55:18]  We had a couple guys with some encouraging comments.
[00:55:21]  Uh, but before we do, for anybody who is interested in one, having a long term investment for future generations and wanting to be a good steward, but then also in the short run, uh, with the potential of economic downturn and those kinds of things, it may not happen right away, but could happen, uh, in the future.
[00:55:38]  Um, where would they go if they wanted to invest with you?
[00:55:41]  Because what I like about you guys is, um, you're all Christians.
[00:55:46]  It's not just, you know, Genesis Gold is not just a nifty name, but you guys are using that name, you know, intentionally.
[00:55:54]  You actually are believers.
[00:55:56]  You love Jesus and you have a similar worldview, you know, to what we do because there are Christians who are perpetual losers and they love Jesus.
[00:56:05]  They're brothers and sisters in Christ, but they kind of think that Jesus is going to, I typically say, return next Thursday, but actually these guys think that he was going to return yesterday.
[00:56:15]  Apparently the rapture was supposed to be yesterday.
[00:56:17]  I was seeing that online.
[00:56:18]  And so they don't necessarily plan ahead.
[00:56:20]  They're not really planning for future generations.
[00:56:22]  But Genesis Gold and Right Response Ministries, we are not like that.
[00:56:26]  And so I appreciate the kindred spirit, the like mindedness of devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ, but also a future minded outlook and wanting to be good stewards.
[00:56:37]  And so for Christians who follow this channel, if they are going to invest in precious metals, I think doing that just in general is wise.
[00:56:46]  But if they can, I'd like to send them your way with a God fearing Christian business.
[00:56:50]  So where would they go?
[00:56:52]  How would they?
[00:56:53]  How would they investigate investing with Genesis Gold?
[00:56:57]  Yeah, absolutely.
[00:56:58]  So, a couple ways, obviously, you can reach out 1 800 200 Gold, that's Genesis.
[00:57:03]  And just mention, obviously, you came from Right Response, so we know who to thank.
[00:57:07]  And frankly, because people that come from you guys, I want to help personally.
[00:57:11]  I believe very strongly in what you guys want to do and what you do on a daily basis.
[00:57:17]  So, I want to support that.
[00:57:18]  I want to be able to help those people directly.
[00:57:20]  But beyond that, Right Response Gold, and I'm sure we can get a URL out there, but that's rightresponsegold.com.
[00:57:28]  Real quick, I think we have a URL, Nathan.
[00:57:33]  Ours, okay, so ours is, and can you make sure that's in the show notes, Nathan?
[00:57:37]  Okay, so it's in the show notes right now.
[00:57:39]  So if you look at the description, check out the show notes for this episode, you'll find it.
[00:57:42]  But it's Write Response, Nathan, Write Response Bible Gold.
[00:57:47]  Is that right?
[00:57:49]  Not Write Response Ministries, but just Write Response Bible Gold.com.
[00:57:54]  There it is, Write Response Bible Gold.com.
[00:57:57]  So that's, we do have a URL, so make sure to use that or call the number.
[00:58:02]  But tell them we sent you, what's the number one more time?
[00:58:06]  1 800 200 gold.
[00:58:08]  Okay, go ahead.
[00:58:09]  Sorry, I cut you off.
[00:58:11]  No, no, not at all.
[00:58:11]  And absolutely, I apologize for mixing the URL there.
[00:58:15]  But of course, that's in the description as well, so people can look there.
[00:58:19]  But I always start by just trying to get to know people, understand where they're at, what they're looking to do.
[00:58:25]  And taking again, I know we spoke a little more on theology and whatnot in the last conversation.
[00:58:29]  I'm sure we'll do more of that.
[00:58:31]  But really trying to make people understand the theology of why.
[00:58:35]  You know, I personally, and you know, why the Bible talks about gold and why I'm so adamant about it being in people's tool belt.
[00:58:42]  So, reach out, we could have a conversation.
[00:58:44]  Hopefully, you know, as you listen to us chat here, you understand that I don't work at a used car lot.
[00:58:50]  It's really not how we operate here.
[00:58:52]  And that's why I'm very blessed to be at Genesis as a whole, we're a group of really faithful Christians.
[00:58:58]  I've met some tremendous men of God here that we all bond on and we're able to spur each other on.
[00:59:05]  And frankly, we'd like to be able to help people in this transition because the world is changing and it's changing very, very fast.
[00:59:11]  And you need biblical wisdom to understand how to facilitate that and how to respond to that.
[00:59:15]  Amen.
[00:59:16]  All right, let's do some super chats.
[00:59:18]  Nathan, can you go ahead and get those lined up?
[00:59:20]  So we have two of them.
[00:59:23]  One is from Gabriel.
[00:59:25]  He gave us $5.
[00:59:26]  We appreciate that, Gabriel.
[00:59:27]  Thanks for your generosity.
[00:59:28]  He said, Thank you for all you guys do from a Gen Z man.
[00:59:35]  We have.
[00:59:36]  By the grace of God, and I take this as a massive win, I'm very encouraged about it.
[00:59:40]  But I would say we've always had a younger audience, but mostly millennial, kind of following my age group.
[00:59:46]  Wes is a young millennial.
[00:59:48]  I'm an older millennial.
[00:59:49]  But it seems like in just the last six months that we've had a huge uptick with our followers, especially on X that are, you know, early 20s.
[00:59:59]  They're young men and some 18, 19 year olds that are following us.
[01:00:03]  And for them, I just think of myself, I'm thinking, good grief, I wish I knew half of what I knew now when I was 18.
[01:00:11]  I would have saved myself a lot of heartache.
[01:00:13]  I'd be in a much better position currently in life.
[01:00:16]  I'd be a better husband.
[01:00:17]  I'd be a better father.
[01:00:18]  I'd be a better pastor.
[01:00:20]  So I'm super encouraged by that.
[01:00:22]  Gabriel, thanks for taking the time to encourage us.
[01:00:24]  I'm glad that you're listening and share our podcast with your friends.
[01:00:28]  In fact, let me say real quick if you're watching on YouTube, subscribe and click the bell.
[01:00:32]  And if you're watching on X, do us a favor and like the video, but also share it.
[01:00:37]  Share the video, just retweet it to get it out there.
[01:00:41]  Wes, you want to read the next one?
[01:00:42]  All right.
[01:00:43]  Hal9K sent $10.
[01:00:45]  Thanks so much, Hal.
[01:00:46]  Said this the sermon on blaspheming the Holy Spirit, this would have been about four weeks ago.
[01:00:50]  Yeah, about a month ago.
[01:00:52]  The sermon on blaspheming the Holy Spirit changed my life.
[01:00:54]  It was exactly what I needed, exactly when I needed it.
[01:00:57]  Not to pray outside of my closet, but I'm back in church because of it.
[01:01:00]  God bless you.
[01:01:02]  Wow.
[01:01:02]  That's awesome.
[01:01:02]  Praise God.
[01:01:04]  Back in church because of it.
[01:01:05]  A lot of people are back in church because of Charlie Kirk.
[01:01:08]  God bless his soul.
[01:01:10]  But that would have been before the shooting, a few weeks before.
[01:01:13]  And so praise God that.
[01:01:15]  That he's using the preaching of his word in our local church, that people online are able to see that and get back in church because of it.
[01:01:23]  So, thank you, Hal9K.
[01:01:24]  That's super encouraging.
[01:01:26]  Praise God for that.
[01:01:26]  For those of you who are curious, you see the podcast, but maybe you're not as familiar with our local church and the preaching ministry there.
[01:01:35]  Right now, we are preaching through the gospel according to Matthew.
[01:01:38]  And we're at the latter end of Matthew chapter 12.
[01:01:41]  So, we're not even quite halfway through the book.
[01:01:44]  It's massive and 28 chapters.
[01:01:46]  And so, we're about Close to halfway through the Gospel of Matthew.
[01:01:51]  And we've been there.
[01:01:51]  I feel like, correct me if I'm wrong, Wes, but I think we've been in Matthew thus far for about a year now.
[01:01:56]  I think so.
[01:01:57]  And I would say we probably have about a year and a half left to go.
[01:01:59]  So this is going to be like a two and a half year series.
[01:02:01]  Hopefully, an Advent series pause, maybe.
[01:02:03]  Well, yeah, we can maybe do that and go back to Matthew.
[01:02:07]  We'll go, you know, at the beginning and then just.
[01:02:09]  You've had one Matthew.
[01:02:10]  How about Matthew again?
[01:02:11]  Yeah, we've had one Matthew, but have we had second Matthew?
[01:02:14]  So, yeah, so it's been really, really great.
[01:02:16]  And for those of you who want to follow along, we encourage you to do so.
[01:02:20]  You can check out the church, and the sermons are on YouTube, but you can also check them out on the church website.
[01:02:25]  You can go to covenantbible.org, covenantbible.org, Covenant Bible Church.
[01:02:30]  That domain, unfortunately, was already taken.
[01:02:32]  So take church out of it.
[01:02:34]  Covenantbible.org, and you can watch the sermons.
[01:02:37]  And if you're looking for a church, we're in Central Texas, about 45 minutes north of Austin.
[01:02:41]  So we are close enough to where there's some economic opportunity, but far enough away to where the police in our county hopefully don't get defunded.
[01:02:49]  So that's a blessing.
[01:02:50]  But if you're looking for a church, we're in Georgetown.
[01:02:52]  Georgetown, Texas, and we would love to have you again to watch the sermons or to find directions.
[01:02:57]  It's covenantbible.org.
[01:02:59]  So I'm going to give the final word now.
[01:03:01]  That's all of our super chat.
[01:03:02]  That's a question, actually, that we had.

=== Physical Gold Options (02:05) ===

[01:03:03]  Go ahead.
[01:03:04]  And I think it'll help a lot of people connect.
[01:03:05]  Bill, we had someone ask in the comments if they invest with Genesis Gold, are they getting the physical gold?
[01:03:10]  You referenced earlier paper gold.
[01:03:12]  Could you kind of parse out?
[01:03:13]  You've got paper gold, you've got physical gold.
[01:03:15]  What do people kind of get?
[01:03:17]  Yeah, absolutely.
[01:03:18]  And, you know, it's so funny.
[01:03:19]  I just had a person I was working with here not too long ago, so this is very relevant.
[01:03:25]  And they initially said, you know what, I want to do gold and silver.
[01:03:28]  And they had already actually done it all by themselves through their financial advisor.
[01:03:32]  And just kind of, I guess, the Holy Spirit tapped on them a little bit and they said, yeah, I'm just going to call anyways.
[01:03:37]  And so they did.
[01:03:38]  And lo and behold, they were completely unaware that they had gold ETFs, which you don't actually have physical gold and silver.
[01:03:45]  You have something that will somewhat, there's some technicals to go over that it doesn't exactly.
[01:03:51]  I mean, in 2008, when gold was ripping, people were looking at their statements if they were in GLD or SLV, the gold ETFs or silver ETFs, and they're saying, why is it gold's way up and I'm not really up?
[01:04:05]  So there is some technicals there that probably take more time to go into.
[01:04:10]  Fundamentally, Genesis Gold Group only works with the physical gold and silver.
[01:04:15]  There's ways to do that through an IRA 401k, and we can absolutely help with that.
[01:04:19]  But a lot of people will mistakenly think they have gold, you know, when they're working through a Fidelity or Schwab or whatnot, and come to find out when push comes to shove, they don't.
[01:04:27]  So always reach out and clarify.
[01:04:29]  I'm happy to answer those questions.
[01:04:31]  So, Genesis Gold, just to reiterate, they actually are working with physical gold, physical assets, and not just an ETF that may or may not follow increases.
[01:04:40]  And then, secondly, you said it real quick, but just to confirm, Guys, you're like, well, I don't have a bunch of cash on hand.
[01:04:47]  So, therefore, you know, I guess I can't invest.
[01:04:50]  Is it true that guys with a 401k or IRA that it's perfectly legal and without taking massive penalties that they can actually work with Genesis Gold and transfer some of their retirement over to physical assets with you guys?
[01:05:06]  That is absolutely true.
[01:05:08]  That is absolutely true.

=== Clarifying Real Ownership (01:12) ===

[01:05:09]  That's huge.
[01:05:09]  So, if people are looking at their 401k, their IRA, and they're saying, you know, I just wish I had more options.
[01:05:15]  I wish I didn't have to be just tethered to, The market, you know, I think maybe we're a little high.
[01:05:20]  I'd like to spread things around a bit.
[01:05:23]  Certainly, we can help with that transition.
[01:05:24]  That's what we do every single day.
[01:05:27]  So, you can move penalty free, no penalties, tax free, those funds from stocks, bonds, mutual funds into physical gold and silver.
[01:05:35]  And that's what we would assist with and go over.
[01:05:38]  As Trump would say, huge.
[01:05:40]  That's huge.
[01:05:42]  All right.
[01:05:42]  That's it, Wes or Bill.
[01:05:44]  Any final word from you guys?
[01:05:46]  Nope.
[01:05:46]  I'll hand it over.
[01:05:47]  All right.
[01:05:48]  Great.
[01:05:48]  So, it's Wednesday.
[01:05:50]  Bill, thanks for coming on the show.
[01:05:51]  You did a great job.
[01:05:52]  This was super helpful for me.
[01:05:54]  I truly believe, by the grace of God, it's been helpful for the listener.
[01:05:57]  We want Christians to be wise and good stewards.
[01:06:00]  And Lord willing, for those of you who are new to our ministry, it's Monday, Wednesday, Friday, three times a week.
[01:06:06]  We live stream Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 3 p.m. Central Time.
[01:06:10]  Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 3 p.m. Central Time.
[01:06:12]  So today is Wednesday, and we are going ahead and signing off.
[01:06:16]  But Lord willing, we will see you again on Friday at 3 p.m. Central Time.
[01:06:20]  God bless.