Europe’s Headlines Hide A Money Story

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You've seen the pictures, French streets on fire, teenagers blocking hundreds of their own schools, and thousands have been arrested. And Volkswagen and German just shut a factory for the first time in 89 years. And if you're watching this in America or anywhere outside of France, you might be thinking, someone else's mess, over there, across the pond. And I thought that too at first. And then I put Europe and the US side by side. So while the media shows you burning bins and riot police, the people with real money in Europe are doing something very different. They are leaving. Britain is now one of the top five places on earth that the wealthy are leaving from. Norway's richest have been packing up. And big British and Irish names are moving their share listings to New York. And I found four cracks underneath all of this. And when I held each one up against America right now, I was surprised and I didn't like what I saw. One of them is already there. Two more are starting to show. And the fourth one, well, it hasn't arrived yet, and it's the one that decides what happens to your portfolio. And I'll show you which cracks have already crossed the Atlantic, and I'll teach you what to do with your money before the rest arrive. And that way you can protect your portfolio and your retirement and even be in a position to benefit from what's happening here. My name is Felix Nicholas Preen. I'm an economist and a former investment banker. I'm the founder of the Preen Institute, where we publish research on financial markets and provide instructions on how they work. They take zero sponsorships or endorsements ever, so I can say whatever I like. And that, of course, was Winston, most importantly, our research hound. Now, before I show you the four cracks, I've done the boring part for you. I've written the whole thing up in plain English with the sources so you can read it slowly and check it yourself. It's a free report. There's no catch. There's a link in the description. You can just grab it and you can have a look after, and you can come straight back here so I can walk you through it. So

Crack One: Promises Nobody Can Pay

SPEAKER_00 2:02

let's go through the four cracks. What's crack one? The promises nobody can pay for. It's the one underneath everything else. So we have to start here. For about 40 years, every government in Europe made the same simple deal with its people. Work hard, pay your taxes, and when you're old, we'll look after you. A pension, free healthcare, a comfortable last, you know, 20 years. And it was a lovely promise. The problem is, nobody put the money aside to pay for it. See, most of these pensions aren't a pot with your name on it, sitting in a bank growing. No, they never were. The money you pay in today goes straight out the door to pay the people who are retired right now. And it only works if there are lots of young workers paying in and not too many old people drawing out. And that's exactly the thing that's broken. People are living 20 years longer than when these promises were written, terribly inconvenient, and they're having far fewer children, which is just quite frankly selfish. So you end up with more and more people drawing out and fewer and fewer paying in. I mean, a lot of these promises were first written. A big crowd of working people paid in for every single person drawing a pension out. Lots of shoulders under the weight. Now that crowd shrinks every year, where the queue of people retiring gets longer and longer. So fewer and fewer carrying more and more. And you don't need a degree in economics to see where that ends up. A pot filled by a handful of workers cannot pay out what a pot filled by a big crowd used to. So something's gonna give. Either the person drawing out gets less, or the person paying in hands over more, or the gap gets papered over with, you guessed it, freshly printed money. There is no fourth option. And the first two doors start with riots, which is why governments keep reaching for the third. France actually tried to fix a tiny corner of this. They tried to move the age you can retire from from 62 to 64. I know the French have it quite, quite, quite good. Just two years, and the country nearly came apart. Millions on the street, rubbish piled up in Paris, you know, the whole lot. Now, look at what's happening right now. The students you saw at the start in the clips, the blockaded schools, the arrests, a lot of that anger is the same anger. A generation being told the deal they were promised isn't there anymore. And this is the bit that should actually make you sit up if you are, say, in America or somewhere else. Because this is not a French problem or even a European problem. It's a maths problem. And the maths doesn't care which country you live in. When a country promises more than it can ever pay, there are only three ways out. You break the promise, which is what France tried to do and it nearly rioted, you know, La Révolution is back, you know, all that, you know, communism does not work so well. You could tax people more, which means what? Well, the the Brits are trying to look present, and everybody who's wealthy is leaving the UK. Funnily enough, the thing to end up in the south of France. But um, in the in the sort of monocle bit, I think. Um but we get back to that later. Now there's a third option. You just print the money and cover it up, water down the value of every euro and pound and dollar already out there, and that's the sneaky one. It's the one that reaches your portfolio and your savings without ever asking you. So picture it like this: you did everything right. You worked and saved and invested for 30 years, the number in your account never goes down, so it looks safe, right? It keeps growing steadily. But guess what? The price of everything you buy, a tank of petrol, a decent vacation, it all keeps creeping up. And your money pile buys less and less every year. No one's taken any money from you, it wasn't tax. They just made every cent you earn worth less. And that's how they're paying for this. So, what do you do about it? Because this is where most people freeze and get frustrated and you know want to call for a revolution. Because even if you can see this coming, but you have no plan, what do you do? So

The Midterms Window For Investors

SPEAKER_00 6:12

I want to give you something right now for free. There is a window opening in the next few weeks that very, very few people are talking about. And it comes down to the American midterm elections. Whatever sides of politics you're on, every election does one reliable thing. It opens the spending tabs, more promises, more programs, more money conjured up. A bill that always, always gets paid later through, you guessed it, your savings. So, how do you arrange your money truly going into these midterms? And what do you do the month straight after? It actually matters more than almost any decision that you could make in the next two years. And I'll be very straight with you. When I studied the data, I was genuinely surprised. Let me just give you one taste of it. Since 1950, the American stock market has been higher 12 months after every single midterm election. 19 out of 19 times. And there's a second and a third, both just as clean. And I'll walk you through those properly. Now, history doesn't guarantee you anything. I have to say that. But it is very, very hard to ignore once you understand these patterns. And I'd like to teach you the whole setup, the exact opportunities in a completely free life training, how to invest for the midterms and beyond. It's free, there's no charge, there's no replay. So you genuinely have to show up live for yourself and learn. Because reading money, reading a moment like this is a skill, a skill you were never taught, which isn't your fault, but you can learn the skill. Anybody can, because I'm gonna sit you down and we're gonna go through it together. So go to midtermsinvesting.com. Link is in the description and grab yourself a free seat. And if you're gonna join me, just write ready in the comments down below, and then I know that you're ready to actually learn the skill, master the skill, rather than just be here for the panic. But let's get back to the panic. Crack

Crack Two: Young People Locked Out

SPEAKER_00 8:08

number two. Um, the young generation has essentially been locked out. Go to almost any big European city and ask somebody under 35 a simple question: can you afford to buy the kind of home your parents had at your age and watch their face? In most of Europe, the answer is no. Not a chance, not ever. A whole generation did everything right. They stayed in school, they got the degree, they took the job, and they still can't afford the life their parents had on less education and one income. House prices run away from wages, rents eat half a pay packet, and the good, secure jobs got rarer and don't pay very much. So you've got millions of bright, educated young people who feel like the ladder got pulled up the moment they reached for it. And that's the fuel under the French protests. It isn't really about two years on a pension age, it's a generation that's done the numbers and worked out the deal. Sucks. In a society where the young have no stake, where they feel they own nothing and never will, is not a stable society. It's a society one bad winter away from the streets. You're watching that literally on live TV in France right now. And it doesn't stop at houses. When you can't afford a place of your own, you put off everything that used to come with being a grown-up. You might move back in with your parents, you wait longer to settle down, you wait longer to have children, or you don't, and which is what feeds straight back into crack number one, remember, because fewer babies today means fewer workers paying into those pension pots, which means the crack gets wider and wider. So they vote for whoever promises to tip the table over, or they take it to the streets, and you can see why the people in charge are nervous.

Crack Three: Energy Costs Kill Industry

SPEAKER_00 9:49

And then we have crack number three. Europe has made it too expensive to make things and to keep the lights on. And that's the one that turned Volkswagen, the pride of German industry, into the headline it opened with you know, from from cars to tanks to cars to drones. It's funny how three rhymes, doesn't it? So for the first time in 89 years, Volkswagen is shutting a factory on German Seoul. So what does that mean? Germany built its whole modern story on being the workshop of the world. The best cars, the best machines, the best chemicals, all of that. Made in Germany meant something. I just drove my Benz into the in, you know, in in in and it was built in the 70s and it's tremendous. It's an amazing piece of engineering. So what happened? Energy got expensive, really expensive. Running a big factory in Germany now costs a fortune compared to running the same factory in America or in Asia. So when your energy costs three or four times what your competitors pay, well, you can't win. You can be the best engineer on the planet and you still lose because numbers, costs, beat crafts and shit. And it isn't only the car makers. It's BASF, the German chemical giant who's been poisoning the planet since I obviously thought of somebody else, but they make stuff that's in everything, right? They've been shrinking. They're building new plants abroad. So the chemical makers pull back. Everyone downstream feels it because they were the suppliers for half the factories in a country. And that's how the industrial heartland comes apart. And that's something that you might recognize in the US. Each factory closing takes its suppliers with it, its wages, its tax. So energy is the hidden killer here. For years, Europe told itself it could carry some of the most expensive power in the world and keep its heavy industry. Well, turns out you can't. And that leads us to crack numero quattro.

Crack Four: Money And Talent Leave

SPEAKER_00 11:40

And this is the one I told you decides what happens to your money. So pay attention to this one. When the first three cracks, three even, told you bankers can't count, and when they get bad enough, something happens that is very, very hard to reverse. The people with money and the people with rare skills leave. No fuss. Just a suitcase and a lawyer, and they take their money and their companies and their tax with them. And I gave you some other names at the start. Britain is now one of the top five places on earth with the wealthy asking for help to leave. Norway raised a tax on the rich, and dozens of its wealthiest people packed up and moved to Switzerland, taking billions with them. But not just the people. Wise and Flutter, two big names that grew up in Britain and Ireland, have moved their main stock market listing to New York. CRH, the building giant, did the same a couple of years back. None of them really made a big deal out of it. They just left. And this is why it matters to your money wherever you live. Money is like water. It flows to wherever it's treated best and it runs away from wherever it's treated worst. When money and talent drain out of a place, that place gets poorer, its currency gets weaker, and everyone who kept their savings there gets steadily poorer too, without doing anything wrong. And by savings, I include your portfolio. And that's what the other three cracks finally add up to. They don't just make headlines, they actually move the money. And once that drain starts, it is horribly hard to plug. The rich and the skilled are exactly the people a country most needs to keep. And they're also the people with the most options and the easiest exits. They don't wait for permission and they don't announce it. And I know it's not a popular thing to say. Some people are going to go a bit loony on me in the comments here. But by the time the numbers turn up in the official reports, those guys have landed somewhere else. And that's why this makes, and that's why this is dangerous. You can watch the first three cracks for years, but the fourth one can tip over in a single bad government tax decision, right? So

Is America Next Or Still Different

SPEAKER_00 13:49

is this an America yet? No. And that's the whole point. Right now, America is where the money is running to, not running from. Why isn't Flatard didn't move to New York by accident? The world's money is still choosing America, which means if you're in America, you're actually on the right side of this crack today. But the thing that keeps money flowing in is trust. And trust is the easiest thing in the world to lose and it's the hardest to win back. So you haven't had the fourth crack yet in America. Now, your job is to make sure your own money is arranged well before it ever does, because there's a fairly high chance it will. Now, let's put the two continents side by side, which is how I've done it for myself. Crack one, the promises nobody can pay for. That one is already in America, right? The big national pension promise, you know, the one tens of millions they're counting on is on track to run short in the mid-2030s, so in a couple of years, according to the government. So this is not a far of worry. That's a child starting school today, reaching adulthood, and not getting the pension they thought they were going to get. The second crack, the young being locked out, is already starting there, and they're starting very fast. Again, ask a 30-year-old American in any major city and say, Will you ever own the home your parents did? And you get that grim, sad face you get in Paris or London. Wages have not kept up with asset prices. The latter is being pulled up on the same schedule, just a few years behind Europe. And on the third crack, the cost of making things in America actually sits on the better side for now because its energy is pretty cheap. And that's a genuinely advantage, and it's the main reason factories are choosing to move towards America rather than away from it. But the weak spot is everything else. The cost of labor, the cost of rules, and that's been climbing very, very hard. So it is a strong position, but it isn't a guaranteed one. And then CRAC four, the money walking out, again, it's not there yet. It's actually the opposite. Money is still coming in to the US, which is the single best thing America is going for, and the thing that it can least afford to take for granted. That's also the reason why I like to invest in the US. So America is not Europe. America has two enormous things Europe has lost: cheap energy and the trust of the world's money. Very, very strong hand. But it's the same four cracks running just on a slightly slower clock.

Three Steps To Stay Calm

SPEAKER_00 16:12

And the difference between a country that cracks and a country that holds is the decisions it makes in the few years when it still has a choice. Now, I don't care about American politics. It's not for me to judge, it's you for you guys to judge for American. I don't get to vote. But what you can control, because you can control politics, you can control what you're gonna do. So what are we gonna do? We're not gonna panic, no. We're going to have a plan. Panic is what the people in the streets are doing, right? Because nobody really taught them what the other option was. Because actually, I think it has never been easier to be wealthy than at this time in history. So we're gonna do the calm, powerful thing instead. And it's generally not complicated. It's just three steps. Step one is to look honestly at where your money actually is. Most people again have no idea what story, what risk, what countries, what their exposure truly is. And then we want to look at step two, which is what you own, is it going to get affected and how by all the money printing? Because when the money gets watered down, a lot of people get hurt, including investors. Jenkash, you definitely get hurt. And then step three, and this takes a little bit more time, but it pays off for the rest of your life, is understand the moment you're in and then keep learning because this is the bit that compounds. It's the learning, it's the skills. These midterms we've got coming up. The spending taps about to open once again. Those three historical streaks I mentioned are all lining up in the same year, which is not a reason to gamble, but it's a reason to be arranged properly and deliberately instead of sitting there hoping it's going to be all right. And every bit you understand about how money really moves is a bit the next frightening headline can't rattle you with. And that's exactly what we're going to do on Saturday. Because the people who got hurt in the years ahead won't be the ones who saw it coming and prepared for it. They'll be the ones who felt anxious, did nothing, and called it being careful.

One Story And What To Do

SPEAKER_00 18:17

So let me leave you with this. Everything you just watched, the schools, the arrests, the factory, the rich slipping out, the side door, none of that is actually random. It's one story. And now you can see the shape of it while almost nobody around you can. And the fact that you sat through all of this and you're thinking about this now instead of scrolling generally puts you ahead of most people. We've already done the hard part, which is caring before it's really urgent. So hold one thought as you go. Europe is further down this road. America is on the same road a few miles back, with a better car and more gas in the tank, which miles of travel to next is still for now a choice. So so is what you do with your own money where there is still time to choose whether to turn left or right or go straight ahead. So do the next thing. Come and let me teach you the actual setup for free life, how to arrange your money going into these midterms and the months after to be set up for what is a truly unique set of circumstances that we haven't seen in 50 years. And learn how the professionals are positioning before any of this reaches your portfolio, your news, and your retirement. So go to midtermsinvesting.com, links down below in the description and the pinned comment. Grab your free seat, write ready in the comments. So I know that you are ready to learn more and ready to be prepared for this and ready to take this opportunity by the horns. It's free, it's life, there's no replay, and I look forward to seeing you there.