Topics Include:

*Commentary on FOMC and Rate Hike

*How VAT may enable a revenue neutral solution to allow Trumps fiscal and tax cuts plan

*One of the dangers to VAT is that it is prone to a creeping rise in the tax rate

*Scenarios for consumer reactions to VAT perceived as price inflation

*How increasingly fragile markets combined with highly leveraged financial services institutions are leading to amplified risk levels for the entire financial system

*Market fragility from Jim’s view is a function of system scale – if you double the size of the system the risk increases exponentially

*The system has not deleveraged since 2008, but has increased leverage and concentrated in an even fewer number of banks

*The derivatives market is approaching one quadrillion dollars in size, approximately ten times the size of global GDP

*Nation debt levels, debt ceiling, comments on the math of servicing the increasing debt burden in consideration of the debt to GDP ratio

*The first $20T of US Government debt is treasury debt, with a debt to GDP ratio of about 105%, and it does not include contingent liabilities such as social security and Medicare

*If counting contingent liabilities, it brings the US debt number to more than $100T, and the debt to GDP ratio closer to 1000%

*The most likely path out of the current debt for the US is inflation, which means inflation is ultimately required and likely