Michael Pento is the President and Founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies (PPS). PPS is a Registered Investment Advisory Firm that provides money management services. The firm also provides research for individual and institutional clients through its weekly podcast called, The Mid-week Reality Check. Additionally, PPS’ Inflation/Deflation and Economic Cycle Model Portfolio SM is replicated by major financial institutions in order to allow their clientele access to the firm’s proprietary Model. Mr. Pento is the author of “The Coming Bond Market Collapse: How to Survive the Demise of the U.S. Debt Market” . Michael is a well-established specialist in markets and economics and a regular guest and has been featured on CNBC, CNN, Bloomberg, USA Watchdog, FOX Business News and other international media outlets. His market analysis can also be read in most major financial publications.
Prior to starting PPS, Michael served as the Senior Economist and Vice President of the managed products division of Euro Pacific Capital.
Additionally, Michael has worked at an investment advisory firm where he helped create ETFs and UITs that were sold throughout Wall Street. Earlier in his career, he worked on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Michael has carried series 7, 63, 65, 55 and Life and Health Insurance Licenses. He graduated from Rowan University in 1991.
Michael Pento is the President and Founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies, produces the weekly podcast called, “The Mid-week Reality Check”, is Host of The Pentonomics Program and Author of the book “The Coming Bond Market Collapse.”
My clients have known for a long time that the nucleus of the next crisis will be in the overleveraged corporate bond market. This notion was confirmed recently in an article from the WSJ: companies that borrow in the junk loan market are now in a far weaker condition financially than they were prior to … Continued
The U.S. National Debt is about to surge like never before, along with the rest of the entire planet’s gigantic pile of sovereign IOUs. America started with a $23.5 trillion debt before the Wuhan virus outbreak, with annual deficits running over a $1 trillion; and projected to be at least that amount for the next … Continued
Wall Street hit a new all-time high on February 20th. It was supposed to be smooth sailing from there, riding along the global liquidity wave. But then, that wave crashed into what turned out to be the fastest correction from a new high in the history of the US stock market. Even though the fall … Continued
In Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s appearance before Congress on February 11th, formerly known as The Humphrey-Hawkins testimony, he asserted that the U.S. economy was, “In a very good place” and “There’s nothing about this expansion that is unstable or unsustainable.” But compare Powell’s sophomoric declaration to what Charlie Munger, Vice-Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway and Warren … Continued
A few days ago the market was crashing on Coronavirus fears. But recently, the market has soared back based upon the hopes of a vaccine and some better than expected economic data in the US. The ADP January employment report showed that a net 291k jobs were created, and the ISM Services Index came in … Continued
Share prices on the major US exchanges are hitting all-time highs at the same time that both the number and percentage of companies that do not make any money at all are rising. According to the Wall Street Journal, the percentage of publicly-traded companies in the U.S. that have lost money over the past 12 … Continued
It is not at all a mystery as to the cause of the wealth gap that exists between the very rich and the poor. Central bankers are the primary cause of this chasm that is eroding the foundation of the global middle class. The world’s poor are falling deeper into penury and at a faster … Continued
God bless Paul Volcker. He was truly a one of a kind central banker and we probably won’t see another one like him ever again. It took his extreme bravery to crush the inflation caused by the monetary recklessness of Arthur Burns and the fiscal profligacy of Presidents Johnson & Nixon. Raising interest rates to … Continued
Super low yields The global fixed income market has reached such a manic state that junk bond yields now trade at a much lower rate than where investment-grade debt once stood. Investment-grade corporate debt yields were close to 6% prior to the Great Recession. However, Twitter just issued $700 million of eight-year bonds at a … Continued
One would have to place their trust in unicorns, sasquatch, leprechauns, and the tooth fairy to believe the current economic construct is sustainable. You also need to be woefully ignorant of history. In fact, there has never been a nation that engaged in massive debt monetization and did not eventually face hyperinflation, depression, and mass … Continued
The stock market has now priced in a perfect resolution for all of its erstwhile perils. Wall Street Shills would have you believe that since the Fed has turned dovish it will always be able to push stocks higher. The trade war is about to reach a peaceful conclusion and that will be enough to … Continued
Recently, there has been a parade of central bankers along with their lackeys on Wall Street coming on the financial news networks and desperately trying to convince investors that there are no bubbles extant in the world today. Indeed, the Fed sees no economic or market imbalances anywhere that should give perma-bulls cause for concern. … Continued
This ageing bull market may soon face the third market collapse since the year 2000. Nobody can predict the exact starting date of its decline—but either a recession or stagflation will surely be its catalyst. During the next debacle, the typical balanced portfolio designed by Wall Street, which consists of approximately 60% stocks and 40% … Continued
The mainstream financial media is absolutely ebullient about global central banks’ renewed enthusiasm to cut interest rates to a level that is even lower than they already are. And, most importantly, Wall Street is completely confident that theses marginally-lower borrowing costs will not only be enough to pull the global economy out of its malaise; … Continued
The Federal Reserve’s recent need to supply $100’s of billions in new credit for the overnight repo market underscores the condition of dollar scarcity in the global financial system. This dearth of dollars and its concomitant strength has left most market watchers baffled. Since 2008, the Fed has printed $3.8 trillion (with a “T”) of … Continued
The Fed has now begun to pave the way for a return to Quantitative Easing. The reason for this was the recent spike in borrowing rates in the Repo market. At his latest press, Chair Powell said this about the spike in the Effective Fed Funds and Repo rates: “Going forward, we’re going to be … Continued
The world of fixed income trading has been extremely volatile lately. Rates have not only spiked in the Treasury market but borrowing costs in money markets have also become extremely disconcerting. The residual effects from Quantitative Tightening, which ended just this past July, are wreaking havoc on the liquidity in bond markets. Ironically, the Fed’s … Continued
One of the best examples of Wall Street’s propaganda machine at work is its willingness to dismiss recessionary signals. The inverted yield curve is a perfect example. Case in point, look at the story that was put out on Market Watch dated November 27th 2006—exactly one year before the Great Recession officially began, the stock … Continued
Last week we wrote about how global central banks have created an economic time machine by forcing $17 trillion worth of bond yields below zero percent, which is now 30% of the entire developed world’s supply. Now it’s time to explain how the time machine they have built has broken down. In parts of the … Continued
We are now witnessing the death throes of the free market. The massive and record-breaking global debt overhang, which is now $250 trillion (330% of GDP), demands a deflationary deleveraging depression to occur; as a wave of defaults eliminates much of that untenable debt overhang. The vestiges of the free market are trying to accomplish … Continued
The Q2 earnings season is upon us and the risks to the rally that started after the worst December on record at the close of last year is in serious jeopardy. We received a glimpse of this with some of the current companies that have reported. For example, to understand how dangerous this earnings reporting … Continued
You should completely understand that the market is dangerously overvalued and that global economic growth has slowed to a crawl along with S&P 500 earnings. However, you must also be wondering when the massive overhang of unprecedented debt levels, artificial market manipulations, and the anemic economy will finally shock Wall Street to a brutal reality. … Continued