HoweStreet

I have known Nigel Farage for years, and whatever one thinks of Nigel politically, he understands something that the establishment in Westminster refuses to admit: Britain cannot continue spending money it does not have while taxing the productive economy to death. Reform UK has now put forward plans to reduce Britain’s welfare bill by £50 billion annually, and the reaction from the political establishment was entirely predictable.

Washington State farmer Joel Gross says government officials turned the regulatory machinery against him after he publicly criticized what he viewed as an unconstitutional assault on his private property. Gross operates nearly 5,000 acres outside Wilson Creek, including about 400 acres of irrigated alfalfa and wheat and another 4,400 acres of rangeland supporting Black Angus cattle.

We’re caught in a trap I can’t walk out Because I love you too much, baby Why can’t you see What you’re doing to me When you don’t believe a word I say? -Suspicious Minds, Elvis Presley, 1969 Elvis Presley’s rendition of Suspicious Minds topped the record charts in 1969. The lyrics portray a romance that couldn’t work, but was also impossible to escape. That’s also a good way to describe our relationship with government debt. We know it can’t last, but we can’t walk out.

August 17, 2026 | Deferring Capital Losses Steve Saretsky is a Vancouver residential Realtor and author behind one of Vancouver’s most popular real estate blogs, Vancity Condo Guide. Steve is widely considered a thought leader in the industry with regular appearances on BNN, CBC, CKNW, CTV and as a contributor to BC Business Magazine. Steve provides advisory services to banks, hedge funds, developers, and various types of investors.

Different cycle, similar Enron-esque financial tricks and behaviours have compounded financial and contagion risks. The segment below connects some important dots. AI infrastructure is being financed by some of the world’s most conservative pools of capital, including life insurance companies and pension funds.

August 15, 2026 | Trading Desk Notes for August 15, 2026 Victor Adair, author of The Trading Desk Notes, began trading penny mining shares while attending the University of Victoria in 1970. He worked in the mining business in Canada and the Western United States for the next several years and also founded a precious metals trading company in 1974. He became a commodity broker in 1977 and a stock broker in 1978.

August 15, 2026 | Tech Talk for Saturday August 15th 2026 Donald Vialoux is author of the free blog Tech Talk, a daily investment report available during the past 20 years at www.timingthemarket.ca. Comments focus on the seasonal and technical outlook for equity indices, commodities and sectors. Mr. Vialoux has 53 years of experience in the investment industry and is a past president of the Canadian Society of Technical Analysts (CSTA). Will history repeat?

Andy Burnham has not maintained Keir Starmer’s migrant policy in full. Instead, he has broken with his predecessor by canceling a key Starmer policy and is publicly advocating for a different approach. Burham aims for “fundamental changes” and has focused on tougher border controls while increasing support for genuine asylum seekers.

Artificial intelligence is moving fast into financial markets — and it may be walking straight into a statistical trap that has fooled economists for decades. About $1.5 trillion in hedge fund assets are already under AI control, and that number is growing rapidly as more programs come online. The promise is seductive: superhuman pattern recognition applied to vast oceans of financial data, finding opportunities invisible to human analysts.

August 14, 2026 | Can US Dollar and Gold Rise at the Same Time? Bob Hoye has been in investment business for some 50 years, making him one of the more experienced researchers. His historical work has been thorough providing the first recognition of the fascinating transition from speculation in commodities to speculation in financial assets. It was controversial when Bob observed that “No matter how much the Fed prints, stocks will outperform commodities”.