USA - When silver surged to multi-year highs, veteran bullion dealer Andy Schectman didn’t see just another price move — he saw a rupture in the foundation of the global metals market. In a wide-ranging interview last week, Schectman argued that what’s happening now represents the physical market finally “calling the bluff” of decades of paper manipulation. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” he began, emphasizing that this was not mere volatility. "Backwardation… shows extreme delivery stress… It’s the market exposing the shortages of physical silver, the frailty of the paper promises.” For Schectman, “backwardation” — when spot prices exceed futures prices — isn’t just a technical quirk. It’s the alarm bell that the supply of real metal is running thin. He believes the era when investors could comfortably rely on “paper silver” derivatives is ending.

ISRAEL - If anyone thought that the return to their homes of the 20 living Israeli hostages meant the end of Israel’s October 7 war, they can’t have been paying attention. US President Donald Trump himself said repeatedly that the war had ended. Then he noticed that, true to form, Hamas was reneging on aspects of his own 20-point ceasefire deal. In particular, it has failed to return all of the bodies of the hostages it murdered and has also refused to disarm. Instead, it instantly started to kill its enemies among Gaza’s clans to show that it was not defeated and still able to control the population. How this will play out is currently unclear. Trump has said, “If they don’t disarm, we will disarm them.” What “we” presumably means in this context is that the Israelis will be permitted to finish them off — thus making the adulation Trump has received for “ending the war” from all those prime ministers and presidents lining up to grovel at his feet in Sharm-el-Sheikh look distinctly premature.

UK - Government debt is at a record high – worth almost 100 percent of GDP in the UK and 120 percent in the US. In Britain, in particular, high inflation is an issue, unemployment is rising and interest rates remain stubbornly high. The big fear with markets now is if investors get jittery about a crash and start offloading their shareholdings, the panic-selling could be exacerbated in an unprecedented way by AI and computer algorithms that act automatically. Brummer warned of an ‘unstoppable tsunami' being unleashed – hence his warnings of potential collateral damage to the wider economy – and said the world economy and markets were now ‘teetering on a precipice’.

UK - With every day that passes, fears of a steep global stock market correction (crash) accentuate. Of course, the doomsters predicting such market carnage could all be wrong. But the drums signalling a meltdown are currently beating loudly and as one – probably as noisily as they did ahead of the dotcom bubble that burst in March 2000. The army of drummers is expanding every day. Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey is now openly talking about a likely ‘disorderly adjustment’ to stock markets. In other words, a market correction. Meanwhile, the financial bigwigs at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) believe some company valuations are ‘quite stretched’. If one of these companies was to publish results way below market expectations, the IMF warns that investment sentiment could deteriorate, ‘valuations would collapse as result, making the broader benchmark index vulnerable’.

UK - King Charles and Queen Camilla are set to meet the new Pope Leo during a trip to the Vatican next week - and Buckingham Palace has announced fresh details about the historic visit. Both Charles, who is still receiving cancer treatment, and Queen Camilla are set to meet Pope Leo XIV in a two-day state visit to the Holy See next Wednesday. It will be the first time that Charles, head of the Church of England, has met the new American-born head of the Roman Catholic Church since his election in May. And in a significant move, the pair will pray together during a special service in the famous Sistine Chapel, marking the first time that the monarch and Pope have done so publicly since the Reformation. It was in 1534 that Henry VIII broke from the Roman Catholic Church to form the Church of England, with the monarch as its supreme head.

UK - The unity of the Church of England has been dealt a major blow to the denomination in a punishing reminder that theological treason has consequences, after a group representing nearly 40 million members — ten times the number of Anglicans in the UK — announced they are the real Anglican Communion and will no longer be in communion with their progressive counterpart, dividing the denomination in two while declaring “We cannot continue to have communion with those who advocate the revisionist agenda, which has abandoned the inerrant word of God as the final authority.” Over the past two decades, the denomination has been liberalizing at a rapid rate, recently appointing Sarah Mullally, a pro-choice feminist as the new Archbishop of Canterbury and allowing the church to bless same-sex couples, with a major contingent pushing the church to deem homosexuality no longer sinful.

USA - Large parts of the US government will begin closing down on Wednesday after Congress failed to pass a funding bill by midnight. Hundreds of thousands of federal workers will be placed on unpaid leave and others will have to report for work without pay until an agreement can be reached in Congress. Russ Vought, director of the White House budget office, instructed agencies to “execute their plans for an orderly shutdown” after a Republican stop-gap measure to fund the government for another seven weeks was blocked by Democrats in the Senate, falling five votes short. A Democratic proposal, that would have kept the government open until the end of October while spending $1 trillion to reverse cuts to healthcare programmes, also failed in the Senate. The shutdown, the first in seven years, could lead to 750,000 federal employees being furloughed for as long as it lasts, according to the Congressional Budget Office, with more being temporarily set aside the longer it persists.

UK - Government debt is at a record high – worth almost 100 percent of GDP in the UK and 120 percent in the US. In Britain, in particular, high inflation is an issue, unemployment is rising and interest rates remain stubbornly high. The big fear with markets now is if investors get jittery about a crash and start offloading their shareholdings, the panic-selling could be exacerbated in an unprecedented way by AI and computer algorithms that act automatically. Brummer warned of an ‘unstoppable tsunami' being unleashed – hence his warnings of potential collateral damage to the wider economy – and said the world economy and markets were now ‘teetering on a precipice’.

PHILIPPINES - The 6.9-magnitude quake has destroyed buildings and left hundreds injured, overwhelming hospitals on the island of Cebu. The death toll from an earthquake in the Philippines has risen to at least 69 as injured patients overwhelm hospitals on the central island of Cebu. Injured children cried and adults screamed while being treated on beds beneath blue tents outside the Cebu Provincial Hospital, having been wheeled out of the building as a precaution against aftershocks overnight. They are survivors of the shallow quake of 6.9 magnitude that struck late on Tuesday off Cebu island’s northern end, near Bogo, a city of 90,000 people, according to the US Geological Survey.

MIDDLE EAST - US President Donald Trump released a 20-point peace plan for Gaza on Monday that fulfills all of Israel’s goals, while offering Palestinians a path to statehood, if Hamas frees the hostages, disarms, and leaves power. Trump released the plan ahead of a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. However, it was not clear that Hamas would agree to the plan, especially disarmament. A Hamas official said Monday that they had not seen the plan, and that while they were open to releasing the hostages, in theory, they would not disarm, seeing the use of force (ie terror) as central to their purpose. President Trump opened the press conference by saying that Netanyahu had agreed to the plan, which the president said could end “decades, even centuries” of conflict, and bring about “peace in the Middle East.” “This can be done the easy way, or it can be done the hard way,” Netanyahu commented. “But it will be done. We prefer the easy way.”

MIDDLE EAST - After a lifetime of opposing peaceful coexistence, a deal between Israelis and Palestinians will depend on hardliners seeing political reality. A wave of Hamas suicide bombings soured public opinion in Israel and helped Netanyahu win the election. He went on to do his best to ensure that the Oslo Accords failed, as he later admitted, as did Hamas. More than 30 years later, both sides now find themselves presented with another roadmap to peace, which neither side has an interest in seeing through. For Hamas, the notion of falling on their swords goes against the nature of the group, which has placed its supremacy above all other considerations. For Netanyahu, a proposal that would see Israel withdraw entirely from Gaza and begin talks that could lead to a Palestinian state runs counter to his life’s mission, as he sees it.

USA - As a US military air tanker fleet travels across the Atlantic Ocean, officials are unsure as to why the fleet has been mobilized. The mobilization of air tankers can indicate that the US or NATO is addressing an urgent military requirement for fighter jet refueling capacity. Behnam Taleblu, senior director of the Iran program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, recalled to the Daily Mail the last time the US had a mass tanker deployment. “Soon after that, something went boom in the Middle East. Critically, in Operation Midnight Hammer, the Trump administration executed a decoy or deception effort to mask the flight of the B-2 bombers to Iran,” Taleblu said to the news outlet. He emphasized that Trump is the only US President in two decades to deploy military force against Iranian nuclear facilities. “Big military movements on his watch are something to keep an eye on,” Taleblu added.

USA - Once praised by elites, net-zero pledges are unraveling as companies realize they cannot meet activist timelines without destroying their own survival. We were promised a “green” utopia, free of fossil fuels, powered by sunshine and breezes. However, the net-zero hobbits living in this imaginary Shire were blissfully ignorant of hard realities dictated by physics, engineering, and economics. Once trumpeted by corporate giants and governments alike, the vision of a world without greenhouse gas emissions is crumbling. It’s pseudoscience coupled with false assurances incapable of sustaining the weight of one reality after another. Major airlines, energy companies, and financial institutions are abandoning net-zero commitments that were always destined to clash with the demands of business imperatives and people’s needs.

USA - President Trump Gives Details on Hegseth’s “Rare and Urgent” Military Meeting in Virginia. As The Gateway Pundit reported last week, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth ordered all of the United States’ top military commanders to gather on Tuesday at Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia. Hegseth urgently announced the meeting on Thursday of last week and originally gave no details on the subject matter. Officials within the Pentagon have since revealed Hegseth’s plans to give a speech on “warrior ethos” and will outline the military’s new direction under the Trump administration. President Trump broke his silence on the meeting and shared, “It’s really just a very nice meeting, talking about how well we’re doing militarily, talking about being in great shape.” He added, “You know the expression ‘esprit de corps’? That’s all it’s about. We’re talking about what we’re doing, what they’re doing, and how we’re doing.” The Independent further reported that President Trump will be present during the meeting.

UNITED NATIONS - Netanyahu To The UN: ‘As The Prophets Of Israel Foretold In The Bible, You’ve Turned Good Into Evil And Evil Into Good’. As Netanyahu stepped behind the podium, the assembly hall was immediately divided. Delegates stood to their feet, many to stage a walkout, and others to enthusiastically cheer, applauding the Israeli Prime Minister as the announcer called the hall to order. Coming at a time when world leaders are unilaterally recognizing a non-existent “Palestinian State,” a blatantly anti-Israel move that Netanyahu referred to as “gutless,” the Israeli leader centered his speech around a verse from the Bible encapsulating the absurdity unfolding at the United Nations.