McKinsey: The growing US national debt threatens investor confidence

The federal debt today stands at $38 trillion, or 120 percent of GDP. This is higher than the 119 percent recorded in 1946 in the aftermath of World War II and barely less than the all-time high set in April 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. The United States has one of the highest national debt levels relative to GDP of major…

McKinsey: " The US is the most economically competitive country in the world today, but it has work to do. Despite accounting for just 4% of the world's population, the US produces 26% of GDP, 27% of research & development, and has 59 of the world's 100 most valuable firms. But the world is changing rapidly, and the next chapter holds immense challenges. How can the US best position itself to…

To put current events in context, the following illustrates Iran's rise from a US-backed state into an Islamic Republic | Iran: Its politics, economy, and impact (March 2026) #DBResearch #Report

Are there financial determinants of great-power decline and fall? This paper proposes “Ferguson’s Law,” which states that any great power that spends more on debt servicing than on defense risks ceasing to be a great power.

States have endeavoured, in some instances, by pawning their credit, instead of employing their capital, to disguise the hazards they ran. They have found, in the loans they raised,…

"Price is Right": oil is the best performing asset in 2026 on US Iran, and geopolitical shocks. Following geopolitical shocks in past 90 years oil is the best performer over 3 months (up 18%), then gold (6%) US stocks (4%); but 6 months after geopolitical shocks gold keeps outperforming (up 19%), stocks stall, while oil reverses all gains. Or "Rock the Geopolitics = trade oil, own gold."

This report from ING, dated February 20, 2026, analyzes Federal Reserve Chair-elect Kevin Warsh's ambition to significantly shrink the Fed's balance sheet. The author, Padhraic Garvey, explores the historical context of the Fed's "bloated" balance sheet and the technical challenges of returning to a "scarce reserves" environment.

The Core Objective: "Putting Toothpaste Back in the Tube"

Chair-elect…

"What follows is an autopsy of a systemic breakdown in the conversion of financial power into physical capacity." - Craig Tindale (Context: Opening thesis on the divergence between money and real-world assets)

"The West faces an adversary who understands that the Financial Ledger is subordinate to the Material Ledger." - Craig Tindale (Context: Explaining the geopolitical shift toward controlling…

"The post-WW2 and Cold War global architecture is crumbling; systemic geopolitical and geoeconomic instability is rising; so are risks of geo-financial instability as fiscal deficits grow, public debt rises, and hopes for rate cuts meet sticky inflation." - RaboResearch (Michael Every & Christian Lawrence) (Executive summary).

"Stablecoins **may play a pivotal role – though ironically they are likely…

US Stablecoins : A US Geopolitical Weapon? #Rabobank #MichaelEvery

Average monthly pace of job growth last year was a fraction of what was initially estimated.

Ultimately, history shows the solution might be a more permanent devaluation. > The Roman Empire serves is the archetypal example of what lies ahead. By the late second century, Rome faced rising military costs to defend its vast borders, while the tax base stagnated. Rather than cutting spending, Emperors began shaving coins or diluting the purity of the denarius. Under Augustus, the coin was nearly…

"Trump is trying to do a reverse Gorbachev and swing back to something that looks a little bit more Soviet and a little bit less American... he's trying to take a system... which is overly weighted towards consumption and financialization and which... is no longer the industrial power that it once was." — Michael Every…

Netflix movie soon...?

#StanDruckenmiller #ScottBessent #KevinWarsch

#Fed #KevinWarsh #RonLauder