(5-15-26) Ep. 210: China Flexes on Taiwan, Courts Undermine Trump Tariffs, Big Banks Feast on Home Foreclosures & Much More.

Today's Articles:

(The Hill) - Xi’s warning to Trump on Taiwan shows emboldened China. (Fox Business) - Trump announces China will buy 200 Boeing jets after Xi talks: 'A lot of jobs'. (Quartz) - A double-win for American business. (Daily Mail) - Banks swipe 42,000 homes from struggling Americans in just one month as housing crisis deepens. (The Wall Street Journal) - Bond Yields Hit Highest in a Year on Oil Fears. (CNBC) - Oil prices jump after Trump says he is losing patience with Iran. (Newsweek) - Fact Check—Did Trump Aide Name Tucker Carlson Possible Domestic Terrorist? (The Gateway Pundit) - Supreme Court UNANIMOUSLY Rules Freight Brokers Can Be Sued for Negligently HIRING ILLEGAL ALIEN AND FOREIGN TRUCKERS in Major 9-0 Decision. (Breitbart) - Trump Delivers 12 Straight Months of Zero Southwest Border Migrant Releases as Illegal Crossings Collapse by 94 Percent. 

Transcript

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Due to the graphic nature of this program, viewer discretion is advised.

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Hello everyone, thank you for tuning in today's broadcast. This is the Friday, May 15th, 2026 episode of the Marco Gerais Show, the only show where the facts are facts and hard truths thrive. We've got lots of hard-hitting news coverage we've got to get into today before our weekend hits, and as always, due to our due diligence, we have to go over our weekly economic report articles today, and of course review our equity markets in great detail for this week. Let's talk about all that today. We'll get into that part very, very soon. But before we get into all that, I want to revisit an article from The Hill published just yesterday evening that pertains to President Xi's remarks to President Trump regarding Taiwan. Let's get down the brass tacks with this one first. This one's very important because during the meeting, Xi told President Trump that the entire relationship between Washington and Beijing would be put in jeopardy if the Taiwan question was not handled well. Now, they made this very, very stern remark. I think this goes to show us that Xi's main issue was Taiwan yesterday. I really do believe that. That's one of the first things they said to President Trump was what's going on between the United States and Taiwan. Now, additionally, China has referred to Taiwan as the most important issue in the China-U.S. relations right now. The White House, on the other hand, did not really mention Taiwan once in its readout of the meeting, and probably President Trump notably did not respond to questions from reporters as well in the topic as he was greeted by President Xi. Now, the cues from both sides depict a scenario in which China is using the issue as leverage over the United States when it comes to things like negotiating, with whether that be economically, whether it be Iran, tariffs, trade, you name it. Of course, which are some of Trump's most top priorities, and the reason why he went to Beijing in the first place. But make no mistake about it, ladies and gentlemen. The United States needs more from China than China needs from the US. And when President Trump was asked about this today, by the way, he refused to even say whether or not he would defend Taiwan at this point. So it's clear that whatever Xi had said to him, whether the word jeopardy was used, conflict, war, this and that, it stuck with President Trump. He's got to play ball with this. We also know that the United States needs China for help with Iran. We definitely understand this. President Trump needs an off-ramp to this war. So he needs X help in all this. He needs G to commit to buying. So we can't ignore all this. This is this is basically this is G holding all the cards right now. And if Taiwan is their number one issue, you can bet your bottom dollar that the United States will back off from this deal of giving arms to the tunes, I think it was $11 billion worth, to the Taiwanese. Moving forward, that's the way I look at this. And by the way, this is not a time to create further confrontations, especially when we need help with Iran, when we rely on China for so many different things. Again, the trade was a very huge part of yesterday. We have to talk about the rare earth minerals we need for EVs, wind turbines, our military advanced weaponry systems, semiconductors, that's all we hear about now. Semiconductors. It's propping up the equity markets, as you'll see later on. Aerospace components, I mean, again, who was there yesterday with them? Elon Musk was there. The head of NVIDIA was there yesterday. All these people are there because they want something from China. They need something from China. Because without China, none of this exists. And Trump is very much aware of all of this. And by the way, we're also heavily dependent on China for pharmaceutical ingredients. We have nearly a quarter of the active pharmaceutical ingredients coming directly from China. We have industrial manufacturing inputs, chemical precursors for drug manufacturing, biomanufacturing, among other products as well, that all come from China into the United States. Again, this is just a crucial list of just a few of these items we get. And we need to get these. What happens if our pharmaceutical market goes in the dumpster? What are we going to do with that? Where are we going to get it from after this? So Xi's very much aware of the fact that yes, the US is very, very dependent on Chinese manufacturing for many different sectors of the government and of course the economy as a whole. So Trump understanding this, by the way, again, Trump is no dummy. He understands this. But what I think the biggest takeaway from all this, again, what I'm reading here in this article, you know, we hear Rubio saying, well, you know, we still support the Taiwanese. Okay, fine, support them all day long. Don't sell them arms then. Don't get in between the two countries. Taiwan and China should handle their issues themselves. And should obviously Taiwan want to rejoin with China, why would we give them billions of dollars in arms? To what? Aid and abet the Chinese military? By the way, the history is very clear, of course. The island of Taiwan, of course, dates back to the Han Chinese moving in in the 17th century. I mean, there's a big history of China being in Taiwan. Of course, the island was absorbed by Taiwan. Excuse me, by China, rather. And, you know, now we have to understand the point that they may want to rejoin. Become a part of China yet again. That that's a realism we have to come to terms with. You know, maybe a decade ago that wasn't particularly so. We have to also understand a couple other things at this point. When munition sales are dwindling in the United States, we're desperately trying to get a hold of things. Look at the amount of weaponry we've given to countries like Ukraine, the money we've spent on munitions and missiles in this war with Iran right now, and our stockpiles are depleting. We've got to ask ourselves the question: why would the United States, why should we be in arm sales with Taiwan right now, that would be used against one of our biggest foes economically, China, that desperately wants to become the next great superpower. That's what they've said out loud. Why would we give them arms to do this? Do we feel that Taiwan is going to be a proxy like Ukraine was to Russia? Which by the way, if you haven't figured that out yet, that was the whole reason why we did all that. To try to weaken Russia? Well, that didn't work out too well, I'd have to say. Again, this is just going to be another wedge put between the United States and China should we continue to do this. So, you know, like I said, if Rubia wants to say we support him, fine, he could say we support him all day long. Stop getting in between the two countries. Stop acting like Taiwan is our proxy against China. It's not going to work out well. By the way, the harsh statements used by the Chinese, it's it's clearly noteworthy that they were obviously very stern about this to Trump, and notice how he hasn't said much about this. He hasn't said much about this at all. He didn't come on and say, you know, I don't back Taiwan anymore. But he hasn't said anything about the arm sales. And again, when he was questioned about it today, he didn't want to say anything about it. So I think he understands. He gets the point. G made it very, very clear. And again, who's holding the cards of this summit? It's China. China is, so why give us another headache? We've already got a headache in the Middle East, which is a mess right now. We've got a mess in Ukraine right now on our hands. We've got a mess in South America. Look what's happening with Cuba right now. Venezuela. I mean, we we have to take care of our own, ladies and gentlemen. That's why I bring some of these things up. But let me just say one thing to you. Like Gerald Celente always says, the great Gerald Celente, the U.S. business is war. And China's business is business. Let's stick with business for once. Let's let President Trump, the great businessman that we're all told that he is, fine, great. Let's work on business here in the United States. We got a lot to do. There's lots of things we can do in terms of manufacturing. I said on the program to you yesterday, since 1999, we lost 2.4 million jobs, U.S. jobs, to China. One million of those jobs were manufacturing jobs. Just simply to China. Let's stop outsourcing our jobs. These companies that get cheaper labor in these other preferred countries, these most favored nations, if you will. Let's bring them back to the United States. So my estimation with all this, just by reading some of this article, you know. Yes, Rubio made it clear. We made our position clear. We and we'll move on to other topics. Okay, fine. Tell the Chinese you support Taiwan, but don't sell them arms. If that's what G said, don't do that. Why give yourselves a bigger headache? It doesn't make any bit of sense, folks. So I think the US got it pretty well. And they know that if the United States does go forth with this, then the 25 million metric tons of soybean will not be bought by China. China may impose tariffs on American imports into China. That could happen. China could greatly reduce the amount of imports that come into the United States. That's obviously a true. They don't have to sell the United States. Now they understand we're a big market. Obviously, there's a big demand for these goods to come in the United States. And again, the biggest the biggest carrot on the stick, folks, is the rare earth minerals that we desperately need for our military munitions. We we have to have this moving forward. Now I told you before, China is going to lead an AI. That's just the way it's gonna be, folks. There's no other way around it. Don't expect there to be another way around it. That's the way it is. And if they decide, for some reason, okay, you're gonna support Taiwan, good luck getting your rare earth minerals refined. We're not doing it for you anymore. Good luck having someone do it better than we do it. Again, they refine over 90% of the world's rare earth minerals. So we would have a major, major problem on our hands if we go down this road. So we've got to weigh the pros and cons here. Do we support Taiwan? Is that something we really need to do? And yeah, look, I know we get certain things from Taiwan that are very crucial. Don't get me wrong. But if they're gonna become a part of China anyways, what's the big deal about it? Stop this. Stop this ridiculousness. Stop it once and for all here. Let's focus on business, stop focusing on war. The Chinese had it seemed like a at least yesterday it seemed like a diplomatic talk. It seemed like there were no escalation points, but it did seem like China was very much so, very, very enthusiastic about telling us to get away from this. So if that was the big takeaway and that was the number one issue, I think we need to, again, look at it and say, okay, we need China for X, Y, and Z. We've got to have these things. Taiwan does much less for us. We can always say we support Taiwan, and by the way, the Taiwanese government came out yesterday saying that we're thankful for doing that. But that's this shouldn't be a major issue to us. Let's move away from the war sales, let's get into the business sales. And again, I believe President Trump can do this if he wants to, but if he's going to do ridiculous things like, again, back Taiwan when China is saying we shouldn't, I think there's obviously something wrong with that. So that's my take on all this. And again, Trump understands the importance of Taiwan to the American supply chain. Again, I understand the American economy. But China obviously has a much bigger crutch in all this. I think China's the third biggest importer in the United States, after Mexico and China, if I'm not mistaken. So let's let's do right by this. Again, let's stop screwing up this global trade, especially in a time like right now, what's taking place inside the Persian Gulf. Alright, folks, so there's that with China yesterday. And in other very, very important parts, let's expound about this a little bit. The side of Fox Business says President Trump said that the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, has now agreed to 200 Boeing jets during their high-level meeting in Beijing. Now let me stop and say this to you. Again, uh big order, so-called? Okay, fine. Where did Ji Kaban say that he was going to sign on a piece of paper? We will buy 200 Boeing aircrafts from the United States. Where did they say this? In fact, he was sitting down with Sean Hannity. I don't know if Sean Hannity was with them on the trip. I really don't know, so forgive me on that one. But I know they spoke yesterday evening. And this is what he President Trump said to him regarding these this deal with Boeing. Take a listen.

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What did he want from the US? Uh a lot of things. Talked about. We talked about a lot of things. Too many things to discuss, but a lot of things. We had a very good meeting, but we want things from that. Um thing he agreed to today is going to order 200 yes. That's a big thing Boeing. 200 big ones. That's a lot of jobs. That's a lot. Oh, we wanted 150, he got 200. Uh he said sort of I think it was a commitment. I mean, you know, sort of like a statement, but I I think it was a commitment.

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So what what does that mean? He thinks it's a commitment, or it's are they actually gonna buy these things? Because we've heard this before with other countries: Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, right? Trillions of dollars are supposed to be invested in the United States. 18 to 21, if I'm not mistaken. How much money was invested last year from these countries that made these so-called pledges they would invest 100 billion, 200 billion, 100 trillion dollars, whatever it may have been. Remember the Saudis said they would invest a trillion dollars? Well, the GDP, ladies and gentlemen, is only $1.24 trillion. So they're certainly not going to give us their entirety of their GDP in one year. So first and foremost, these investments, if even if they start coming out, which none of them have, by the way, and I know because I've looked, none of them have invested in the United States yet. None of them have given anything to the US to build anything inside the US yet. Is this just another one of these things? Where Trump says, well, they're gonna buy 200 Boeing 747 jets. Yep, okay, great. Sounds good, right? Okay, it sounds good. That means more of our taxpayer dollars going into Boeing, right? Okay. Oh, geez, folks. Uh, here we go. But, anyways, here's the big takeaway from all this. Boeing said they had actually hoped for 500 plus aircrafts in the deal. And now, as a result of this, the investors have now seen their stock plummet now. I think it plummeted to what? Almost three percent today as a result of that. Yep. So again, you know, we we hear these things, they sound good on the abstract. Okay, we're gonna get more investment. I'm sorry, it was four percent since the announcement probably dropped a little bit yesterday as well. Down, it's down three percent today. Oh my goodness. Yeah, so obviously we we didn't get what we wanted from the the Chinese, obviously. But it did look like we had a good deal with the soybean farmers, so they must be happy about that. Okay, great. Finally. Good for them. They need it. Now let's get them some fertilizer, Mr. President. I think that's the most crucial part about all this. So whether or not they get these planes, I don't know. Whether however this works, I again I don't know what did they say how much money they would spend for these planes? Did they say how much for excuse me? The jets, rather? Okay, we're gonna give you $150 billion. Build us 150 new jets. Quite the opposite, right? We we have no idea. Oh, they I think they really want to do this. Well, okay. We'll see if they really, really want to do this. But it seems like Boeing does not believe that this will probably happen. Certainly, it didn't not meet their expectations as to what they actually wanted from the Chinese. Alright, folks, let's go on to something else here. I think this is a very important topic we've got to discuss in this development here. This comes out of courts. It says that a double win for American business. What's going on here? Well, American businesses were locked in a week in a win earlier this year when the Supreme Court struck down President Trump's universal tariffs as illegal. We all remember this, the AIPA bill that he tried to push through using that resolution. He tried to say, well, I can, you know, because of the economy, because of these trade deficits we have with all these countries, I'm going to now slap on all these tariffs to all these different countries because they're ripping us off, right? That was the big takeaway. They're ripping us off, even though they're sending goods that we all purchase and buy and we need it inside the United States. So the trade deficit is only there because we import more from that particular country. Let's use China for an example. We import more from China than what we export to China. And that's why we have a trade deficit. It's not because China's ripping us off. So President Trump uses these tariffs. Now, I will say that they were illegal, obviously. Because, of course, we have to go through Congress. Congress should have acted. If President Trump wanted these, he could have gotten Congress to act on this, but he didn't. He decided to go on his own. And that's why one week he'd say, well, we got a 25% tariff on China. Oh no, it's going to be 150% tariff on China. Then he'd scale it back and say, no, no, no, we're really not going to do that. Oh, then it was I'll put a 50% tariff, then I'll give him 50 days to think about what this. And it was a big mess. And it was a big mess for our economy too, because people couldn't figure out what exactly was going on. Are they going to have to sell their items from that they get from China for 50% more? What's that going to mean for that business, particularly if they buy from China? Or if China's their number one retailer. What's going to happen then? Anyways, it was a big mess, as you all know. But now President Trump shot back and he decided he was going to use another law crafted in the 1970s, again, cited for distinct economic crisis. What's the economic crisis now? Anyways, last week the Court of International Trade knocked down the 10% global tariff that the White House imposed only days after the defeat by the Supreme Court. And it really invalidated the second wave of the universal tariffs on everything coming into the United States. And they said that was not justified under this 1970s law. And as a result of this, the federal judges in this case kept the ruling narrow only pausing tariffs on the plaintiffs in this particular case, made up by two small businesses and the state of Washington. And I found this pretty interesting, so I asked myself, why would they just do this for just a couple of small businesses? And the reason why it was only so small, and not obviously universal across the United States, is because the U.S. courts generally do not do a universal or nationwide or national injunction unless absolutely necessary. And because only the plaintiffs had demonstrated legal standing to receive this sort of relief. Now, does that mean it won't be an offshoot under something else, and these other businesses or states come on board and say, hey, we need some help with this too? That could be something that happens later on, but I thought this was pretty interesting that we were talking about this. And again, as a result, one of the things that President Trump has always said, he said, we get one ruling. So for example, if the AIPA tariffs were shot down as illegal, which exactly they were, then they go into something else. They use another piece of legislation. And they say, okay, well, I can slap on a 10% global tariff now, and every everything coming inside the United States, I'll do a tariff that way. They use that until, of course, that gets shot down, and then they go to something else. So we get one ruling, and we do it a different way. So Trump will have something else up his sleeve, uh, should they get shot down, of course, which this one did, but I find it interesting. The Trump administration has since appealed the ruling, putting in motion another legal battle revolving around the signature tariff policies he's used to encourage domestic manufacturing, which has not worked, by the way. We haven't gotten any flow of manufacturing into the United States yet. And again, coerce the foreign governments, which was the initial idea, and that's what everyone's expectation was. We put these tariffs on, these businesses decide to invest inside the United States, and then they continue to operate here. In other words, the jobs that we outsource come back to the United States. Now, importers have in are estimated to have paid $25 billion under the interim tariff regime so far. This is the new round of tariffs. I believe the last round brought in some $166 billion, of which President Trump may have to pay back the way we're looking at it. Now, the Trump administration has appealed as to Decision, as I said to you before. But look at this. It says here U.S. Customs and Border Protection is in charge of issuing $166 billion in tariff refunds over 330,000 importers. Can you imagine that? Now many trade analysts initially feared this process would get tangled up in the bureaucratic hurdles that delay these payments. So far, they're uh obviously working on all this. But here we go. Early data from the legal filing show that the Customs and Border Patrol is usually taking a week to validate refund declarations, a quicker timeline than anticipated. The first round of these refunds started reaching the importers earlier this week, and around 75,000 businesses have now filed for applications for these refunds with potential hurdles for some smaller firms as well. So let me let me let me let me point this out to you. These tariffs were put into place. Now, what you think about this? And a tariff is a tax. Now, whether it was a 25% tariff or 50% or 10% or 5%, whatever it may have been, that translated to you, the consumer. So for example, if you bought a good from China and it was 10% more, if you bought something from the EU and it was 15% more, right? I get my olive oil from the EU, right? My Italian olive oil, my Moroccan olive oil, I gotta have it. I'm not gonna buy it from here inside the United States, so what happens? I have to pay a 10% larger fee on that. But here's the thing. That money was paid for right before it even got to the United States. That money was transferred, the fee was taken. Just think about what's taking place in the Strait of Hormuz right now. They pay the two million dollars, the ship gets to move through. Okay, but now they that ship now has two million dollars more in logistics to traverse to wherever it's going. So when it docks in port, that person that's running that boat, the shipping company says, hey, listen, you know, it's gonna cost you a little bit more now, uh, because now I had to pay two million dollars just to get this here to you. On top of I have to pay my crew, the food, you know, the maintenance of the ship, the you know, obviously the fuel that caused it to to travel, cost so much money and what have you. That gets transferred on, folks. And it just keeps going down and down the line. Now, in this case, with these tariffs last year, we paid higher prices, and we know this because we know CPI numbers were up last year, consumer price index numbers. So as a result of this, that money translates to you, the consumer, at the store when you buy it or when you buy it online. Are you getting any type of refund? Of course you're not. Of course you aren't. So you paid more for the same good, that could have been obviously much less. They paid that tariff to the United States Treasury, they translated that cost onto you, you paid that to them, really. They're the ones that make the profit in the end. And now they're getting their money back. Isn't that something? So these these big companies, these obviously these importers, uh made a pretty good investment on this, don't you think so, folks? So I find this so hilarious that they're getting their money back, even though we've all all paid for this, you and I at the store. It's amazing how these things work out in the end. So again, the the business is made out on the end, right? And of course, you paid more for the same goods. So they they made they made very nice profits. They must have been ecstatic about this. We can get our money back after we paid you already, we've charged the customers even more. Great, perfect. Love it. It's amazing to me how this works. It's so ridiculous on so many different fronts. Um, but I just thought this was interesting to tell you. So, yeah, there's some win for the small businesses in this case. Obviously, getting away from these tariffs, obviously making it more difficult, especially for small businesses, by the way, to keep up the bigs, obviously. In many cases, can get things at retail value because they buy so much at one given time. So, really, it's good for the small businesses that they get some relief here from away from these tariffs so they can compete with the larger businesses. So I thought that was interesting. I I would share that with you. But I always find it funny that the the bigs keep getting more money, and we, the you know, the consumers, we keep getting screwed on the other end of this. And by the way, if you thought that wasn't bad enough with the economy, listen to this. This is out of the Daily Mail. I typically don't like the Daily Mail, but this is a really good article. And I want to bring this all to everybody's attention, so let's take a look at this because it's a story worth looking at. Foreclosure filings across the United States have surged 18% compared to last year, and a troubling sign that mounting financial pressure is beginning to hit homeowners right here inside the U.S. Now, if this isn't a red flag that speaks of 2008 and the Great Recession, I don't know what will. Now, this financial pressure now is mounting to thousands of families all across the United States. Look at what they found here in this data. It says here that the new data released by the real estate analytics firm ATOM, that's the acronym for them, found that 42,430 properties nationwide received foreclosure filings in the month of April in 2026, including default notices, scheduled auctions, and bank repossessions. While filings dipped slightly from March, experts warn that the sharp year-over-year increase points to a growing strain in the housing market as Americans grapple with stubbornly high borrowing costs and affordability problems. Now, let's all let's take this back a notch. Why would this be happening if the economy was doing so well? I'll tell you why. How many times do I come on this show and I tell you, oh, look, Starbucks, for example, I looked at this article in Just the News. Starbucks was laying off some 300 of their administrative positions all across the country. Atlanta, Dallas, you name it. They're getting rid of about 300 people, scaling it off. Cisco, again, same thing. They were laying off a certain number of people. I think it was maybe a couple thousand, I can't remember. Forgive me on that one. But we look at these tech Amazon. Amazon recently, recent couple months, was laying off a certain number of people because they're being replaced by AI. So I want you to think about that. These people that get these good paying jobs, for example, I'm not saying it's just all these people, but they're getting these good paying jobs so they invest, right? Maybe you get a good paying job for, let's say you make a quarter mil a year. And you want to buy a house now. You're ready to buy a house, you're ready to settle down, great, wonderful. You think, oh wow, I'm working for Starbucks now. This is great. Okay, um, Starbucks isn't going anywhere. Well, Starbucks isn't going anywhere. You are. You're going somewhere because your job can be replaced now. Because the AI boom. They're investing in this AI. They don't need a lot of these positions, these white-collar positions anymore. And so what happens? You get laid off. As a result, that maybe you can't find something in your area, and what happens? You can't make your payments, and then obviously, the house ends up getting repossessed and foreclosed on, and then you have nothing to show for it. Now, the data also shows foreclosures starting the first stage of the process, climbing 12% from a year earlier to 28,414 properties. And meanwhile, the completed foreclosures where lenders repossess homes after borrowers failed to make the payments skyrocketed 42% annually to 5,098 properties. Now, despite the jump, the foreclosure activity still remains below the pre-pandemic levels, according to Adam. And again, we look at various states here. It looks like Delaware had the highest in the nation. South Carolina followed shortly behind them. Indiana, Illinois, some of these bigger states. But I again I thought it was interesting too. They had some metro areas, and Lakeland, Florida, by the way, which is right outside of, I believe, Orlando, had the most severe foreclosure rate, with one filing for every 1,221 housing units. Well, Columbia and Charleston, South Carolina, Bakersfield, California, Cape Coral, Florida. And, you know, we see a lot of people moving during COVID too. I think that's part of the take on this, too. You know, maybe you left New York, maybe you left California, maybe you left Illinois. And you made your way to Florida. And now something happened with your career because we're seeing a lot of people getting laid off, as you know. We lost 1.1 million jobs last year. Now, do we did we hire back 1.1 million jobs since then? I I doubt it. The numbers certainly don't indicate that. So, what do these people do? They might try to do something, but they some of them may have gotten hired in other positions, but what do you do then? When you have yourself invested, and we see, for example, housing affordability remains under intense pressure, mortgage rates are climbing. We saw this last year. We've talked about this on the program so many times. And we're looking at multi-year highs now, locking so many Americans into these expensive monthly payments, these mortgage rates, while the home prices remain elevated across much of the country. And, you know, when you buy a new house, you're, you know, you may think that, okay, well, I'm in this good position. What happens when it goes away? What happens when you can't make those payments anymore? And that's where the rise in the bank repossessions continues to come in. So I say this to you because we're getting levels of inflation right now, and we're seeing the elevated housing cost. And I know people, obviously, they want to buy. We know many people want to buy in the United States, but sometimes it's not good to buy right away. That's what I'm trying to tell you. So don't get too eager right away once you get a new position. I understand the I understand the want, don't get me wrong. Uh but right now not everything is sending so like it was maybe 20, 30 years ago, where your job was safe, where your job was necessary. They needed you in that position. Now we're seeing the AI bubble starting to grow, and you're seeing the investments in that, especially in 2025, and again at the start of this year, we're seeing it right now. And I told you it's pretty soon we're gonna have this AI bubble bust this year. God only knows what's gonna happen then, but the big takeaway, folks, the big takeaway from all this is that right now the housing market is really, really uncertain. I would think twice before buying this year if I were you, especially in uncertain times. We don't know if your job's gonna be there next year. Why give yourself this you know position where you're gonna be foreclosing on a house, and of course, what that does to your credit and what have you? So I would just say, folks, take it easy, take it easy, it's gonna be a rough 2026. That's just the way it's gonna be. And you know, I figured I would share this with you because again, this is indicating that we're losing these good-paying jobs, we're not gaining them. So take that as you will. And by the way, I'm glad I brought all this up to you right now because we've got to talk about now what's taking place, not just in the housing and market, but now let's take a look at the the bond market. What's going on in the bond market today? This is out of the Wall Street Journal. It said bond yields have now hit the highest in a year now on oil fears inside of the United States, as one could imagine. So we're seeing the bond yields around the world are now kind of sapping investors' appetite for the stocks now, and they're kind of interrupting a chip stock rally that fueled major indexes to fresh highs of this week. And the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield now jumped above 4.59%, the highest it entered a yield since May 22nd last year. And the 30-year US Treasury rose above 5.1%, poised for its highest close in nearly two decades. Now, let me just remind you, the last time it was that much, I believe, for a 30-year was in 2007. What happened in 2008? I'll let you figure that one out. So we're seeing a little bit of a mix in the stocks today, ladies and gentlemen, but uh, you know, I'm seeing that that bond yield starting to go up. And I'm fearing once it hits that 5%, it's going to indicate a couple different things. Now, just because the bond yield rises doesn't necessarily mean we're in economic woes. However, we know, because again, you listen to my show, you understand this, we know that the economy is not what they're saying it is. A lot of things are being propped up, especially in the equity markets. And why this matters today is because right now, what we're looking at, we're looking at sticky inflation numbers. We know the inflation is going up. It's estimating to go up. We have oil and shipping disruptions right now. We've got large U.S. deficits. We're seeing, again, a massive treasury issuance right now. We've got geopolitical tensions right now. There's uncertainty about the Fed's future policies, especially about the Fed possibly hiking interest rates. We don't we don't know what's going to take place. Maybe they go up, maybe they go down. Probably not going to go down anytime soon, though. Especially if inflation is rising, they can't do it. We haven't met our 2% goal. That's certainly not going to happen anytime this year. So it doesn't matter if Kevin Warsh gets in, he's not going to lower the rates yet. It's just simply not going to happen. So all those factors don't indicate a strong economy, especially when I've told you people are starting to foreclose on their homes. We're seeing lots of layoffs, especially in the white-collar jobs. So while the a raise in the bond yield doesn't always indicate that things are bad, we have to look at our current stance right now. Where are we economically? And right now, all those things, this economic unpredictability, these this volatility, especially in the markets, which again are being proped by the government, kind of tell me that things are not headed for something good. So that's what I when I say this to you, I'm saying that right now in 2026, a 5% bond yield doesn't always indicate a poor economy. Not always. There are times when you could see a strong economy with a 5% yield. That does happen. However, we're not on that path right now. So we've got to come to terms with that and understand that, yes, there are going to be some rough times ahead. That's why you're seeing that. So, as a result of that, where are we in our stock market? Why not let's let's take a look at our stocks today? Let's let's take a good long look at where we are today. Let's jump right into it. Let's not waste any time. Looks like the Dow Jones is now trading at $49,526.11, down just over 1% today. Looking at the SP 500, we've got $7,408.50 per share, down 1.25%. And the Nasdaq down some 410 points today at $26,225.14 a share. And we have to ask ourselves, why is this all happening today? So obviously, all three indexes are now down, and pressured by rising treasury yields and inflationary concerns. That's why this is happening. We have the NASDAQ remaining the strongest performer of the week, supported by the AI-related stocks. Again, I told you before, the government's bullish on these stocks. Look who was in China with President Trump. What's his name? Jensen Jensen Huang. He was there, the head of NVIDIA. Okay, because he needs something from China. They're desperate to get this. They need investments. So that's why these things again, we're propping up AI. That's why you're seeing these stocks do so well. But again, Wall Street and Main Street are two totally different things. Never forget that. SP 500 is mixed, hovering a near record level, but losing some momentum later in this week. And the Dow is the weakest, falling back below the $50,000 threshold, as industrials and financials face rate pressures as well. Okay, so there we go with that. So we're in the red for our top marginal stocks. How are we doing in our tech stocks today? Let's look at Bitcoin first. Bitcoin is trading at $78,945 a share, down some 612 points today. Apple's trading at $243.18 a share. Up $1.92. Microsoft trading at $469.55 a share. Down almost a half percentage point. Then we look at NVIDIA. Nvidia trading at $1,204.77 a share. It is down some let's see, 1.53% today. We've got Amazon coming in hot. $231.44 a share. Up almost a percentage point today. Meta trading at $498.72 a share. Down some three, almost you know, almost a percentage point. 0.62%. Tesla, again, who was in Beijing, Elon Musk. Yep. Trading at $176.55 a share, down 0.81%. And then we look at Google trading at $182.66 a share. Down almost a half percentage point. And yeah, those so the the tech stocks are mixed all this week. Again, we have a lot of trade happening, uh, for example, with the semiconductors and all that. Uh a lot of the, like I said, the AI-related stocks, again, having a little bit of a mixed week, so that's why we're seeing a lot of this take place, as always. All right, let's move on. Let's go into our gold or silver or platinum and palladium. Let's see how we're doing today. Everything's in the red. Gold trading at $4,552.90 a share, down 2.83%. Silver trading at $76.73 a share, down 10.07%, taking a big hit today. And we've got platinum trading at $1,985.90 a share, down 5.04%, and palladium trading at $1,436.50 a share today. Again, we have yields climbing. Uh, we have inflationary concerns, we have a little bit of a stronger dollar right now, so we see gold prices continue to fluctuate downward just a little bit. Uh, same thing goes with silver. Again, silver is also used uh obviously as a as a commodity as well, especially in military. So we see some shifts in that. So, overall, uh hitting uh a much lower week uh for our precious metals, unfortunately. But then we look over to our oil. Where are we in the oil pricing? Well, let's look at Brent Crude first and foremost. That's trading at $109.43 a barrel, up 3.50% today, right now. Yep, going upwards, folks. It's not going back down again. And we have the West Texas Intermediate trading at $105.69 a share, up 4.47% today. And why are the oil prices jumping up? Well, because President Trump says that he's losing patience with what's taking place in Iran. So that's why we're seeing the oil prices continuing to say elevated today. And obviously, President Trump likely has turned his attention back over to his stalemate with Iran right now. Obviously, President Xi didn't offer him too much assurance that this would end very quickly. You know, we got a little bit back and forth. You know, the Chinese said, okay, the Iranians shouldn't have a nuclear weapon. Okay, fine. Most of the world says that. So what? That doesn't mean the war is ending. What are they gonna do to open up the strait? They say, oh, well, we want the strait to open up. Okay, fine. Just like we want Taiwan to be independent, I guess. Uh what does that mean? It doesn't mean anything. Now Trump told Fox News that he's losing his patience with Iran. He says, I'm not going to be much more patient. They should make a deal. Okay, fine. Again, who's holding the cards in that situation? Again, Iran is. And again, no one's coming to help Trump. That's the thing. I don't think G is gonna go and say, listen, you must uh give President Trump everything he wants. Everything, every demand he wants, you've gotta give. That's not gonna happen. It's not gonna happen. They're one of their biggest trading partners as well. They get much of their oil that comes in through imports from Iran. Why would they again stab Iran in the back? They're not gonna do that. They know they can obviously use the Belt and Road Initiative. Obviously, Pakistan knows that they have trade routes coming into Iran as well, and we know that, of course, they can trade with Russia to the north using the Caspian Sea. So Iran has many different trade routes. It's not just limited to what comes through the Strait of Formos. And Iran, if Iran is successful in all this, and they decide to trade in the Chinese Yuan, do you think Xi is gonna move away from that position? Do you think he wants the Yuan to be more or less desired? Obviously, he likes what the Iranians are doing. So if they pay in the Chinese Yuan, he likes that. It's good. It's gonna pop it's gonna prop up their currency. Same thing with the rail. A lot of different countries go through that trade of war moves that are now gonna have to demand access to that currency. So it's gonna be a very big win win for both Iran and China as well. So, of course, he's going to say, Yeah, we want the strait to be open for commerce. But he's not going to force President Trump, who started this war. I'm sure X let him know that when he was meeting with them. And so there you go, folks. That's why we're seeing oil prices elevating again because the realization is that the supply chain is now bottlenecking. The late, the latest of the shipments coming out of the Persian Gulf have now reached their final destinations last week. And the realization that no more is coming in is going to finally set in with, especially a lot of the oil industry right here inside the United States. So yeah, we could say, okay, we're going to sell some of our energy, we're going to sell oil to China. Fine. Sell some more oil to China. We produce about three, and what is it, 13.6 million barrels we refine every single day in the United States? Okay, fine. Sell it to China. What's that going to do, though? It's good for the oil industry. It's not good for the United States to diminish our supply. And remember, everything is traded on the global market, folks. Never forget this. So we could say, okay, we're the number one producer of oil every single day. No one doubts that. We look at all of the energy inside the United States, the liquefied natural gas, you name it, we're producing somewhere around 24 million barrels per day of it. For petroleum specifically, 13.6 million barrels every single day. It's a lot. We're the number one producer. God bless us. But if we're going to continue to sell now to again China, for example, or to Japan, which we again ally with, we have less on our own market. And we have very little that's going to be coming in, especially from Venezuela right now, because we don't have the existing infrastructure. And we also don't have the oil that's coming in from places like the Persian Gulf. That is completely shut off right now. So let's not forget any of that, folks, moving forward. So those gas prices, you're going to see them start going up and up and up. And as Trump continues to escalate again, uh, that's going to be something that is going to cause the price to continue to go up. Because now there's nothing in the works. Nothing's in the works now, and everything that comes out of that Persian Gulf now will cost $2 million more to use those ships. So everything is going to be much more expensive moving forward. And you can thank President Trump for that moving forward. Alright, folks, let's move on. And, you know, this is going to make you want to scream, I think. I've got to be honest. If this is going to make you want to scream, I don't know what will. This is on a newsweek a couple days ago, but I was reading it earlier and I thought you'd all enjoy this very, very much. So let's take a look at it. It says here, did Trump aide name Tucker Carlson a possible domestic terrorist? What is going on here? Now, conservative deputy Alex Jones said on Wednesday that Sebastian Gorka, a counterterrorism official in the President Trump administration, has named far right far right far right media personalities Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes as possible domestic terrorists. Why? Because they say things you don't like to hear? Does Gorka not remember that we have a First Amendment in this country? Have either of them led any sort of violent protests in the United States? Of course not. They speak their minds behind a microphone, just like I do. Just like most commentators do. And now we're going to label them as domestic terrorists. And by the way, we we heard about this earlier in the year. The reason I bring this up is because this is a First Amendment issue. First and foremost. Tucker's not a violent guy. He's not leading a protest, he's not telling people to go out and hurt people. Nothing of the sort he's doing like that. Okay? He's not in charge of any uh fringe group, of course, that they're doing some radicalized things in the streets, for example. He's not the head of Antifa. Okay? Let's just make that very clear. The problem with this, and I said this when this was coming out, they were talking about designating Antifa as a terrorist group. Okay. Most people on the right would agree with that. They're very violent in the streets. Uh they can obviously cause chaos in the streets. I'm not debating that at all. The problem you get with that, though, when you go out and label an entire group as a terrorist organization. The problem you get with that is once, for example, the Trump administration can do that with Antifa, what's stopping the Biden administration from doing that with the Proud Boys? Okay, well, we understand this, I hope. So what takes place then is that you can label anyone you don't like as a domestic terrorist group. We do this all the time. Hezbollah is a domestic terrorist group, right? Inside their country, so-called. Because why? Well, they fend off Israel's invasion of the country. That's why they're there. So they're terrorists. Same thing with Hamas, same thing. Now, that doesn't mean they haven't done bad things, don't get me wrong there. Um, but the idea that these any group we don't like, you know, we say this with Iran. Iran's the number one state-sponsored terrorism. We hear that ad nauseum. And I relayed you the information from the CIA that since 2000, the document was published a couple years ago, but since 2000, over 80% of all the terrorist acts all around the world come from Sunni Muslim groups, not Shia Muslim groups. Iran didn't even make the top 10 of the list. It wasn't even close to the top. But that doesn't stop people from saying it, does it? You know, when we look at ISIS, the Taliban, the Al-Qaeda, look at things, groups like Boko Haram and Africa that are killing Christians right now. You have to ask yourself, how is Iran the number one state sponsored of terrorism? Iran hasn't invaded any other country in over 200 years. Where are they exporting all this terrorism? Who are they funding? Well, they fund Hezbollah, who we don't like because they're Isra they oppose Israel, but then we that they don't like Hamas because they oppose Israel. They're not defending these groups' actions, by the way, to a T. But what I am trying to say to you, if we're looking at the number one state sponsors of terror, it's it's certainly not these groups. Nowhere's close and it certainly isn't Iran either, by the way. So we've got to ask ourselves the question here. Is the Trump administration simply going after people they don't like? Tucker Carlson? Because what, he has a show now that he speaks his mind, he brings in various different guests. And again, you could agree with things that Tucker says. You can agree with things Nick Fuente says, it doesn't bother me. But my point is you have a right to listen to that, just like you have a right to listen to my show. And if you don't like my show, you can turn it off. If you like my show, of course you can share it like many of you do. Again, I tell you the facts, I don't tell you what I want you to hear. And we've got to be very aware of this. This is very dangerous because, again, we know both sides use. We know that under the Biden administration. We have the DOJ looking at Catholics that were attending Latin mass. They were looking at moms that were going to school board meetings, they were up in arms about their kids learning about transgenderism and sexuality in elementary school, and boys in girls' restrooms. God only knows why this is happening in our public schools and why we're funding this. But regardless, these were the people they were looking at. People that were in pro-life groups. So it's easy to label a group or an individual as a domestic terrorist. It really is. And it's not difficult to add this label to anybody. Now the claim comes from Alex Jones, comes as a as a civil war is broken out with the president and the mega movement, as some prominent conservative influencers, like Tucker Carlson, who was once greatly aligned with President Trump. Think Marjorie Taylor Green. Think even Thomas Massey, who they're trying to oust right now, as they funnel millions of dollars into this. I would call him a rhino. I don't know the guy well, but Ad Galreen. Obviously the guy is bought and paid for by the Israel lobby. Thomas Massey wants the Israel lobby to register as foreign agents. This is why he's a target. So every time you see this, you gotta look at what's actually what is this person actually doing? They say Thomas Massey's a rhino, he's a traitor, and now they're accusing him of a sexual assault. Something, of course, he vehemently denies. You know, a couple days before this primary that he's in fighting for his spot in Congress. Probably one of the only ones that really fight for us. You know, there's only a handful, you could probably count them all in your hand. The ones that fight for us day in and day out, and that are consistent. Thomas Massey votes for the Republicans, I think, 91% of the time. And they say, well, Thomas Massey opposes MAGA. No, he doesn't. No, he doesn't. He opposes certain things that President Trump has done, and by the way, I disagree with some of the things President Trump has done as well. So to put yourself again, stop putting yourself in these groups too, by the way. I'm MAGA, I'm conservative, I'm Republican. Okay, fine, whatever. Think for yourself. That's what you need to start doing. Think for yourself. Stop giving yourself just this title, and you have to do everything that a so-called leader of the group does for you. Again, President Trump can make any statement he wants. And I, as an individual, I as a free man, can say I agree with it or I don't agree with it. Or it doesn't align with my values. That's why I speak out against this war. It doesn't align with my values. I don't like wars of aggression. By the way, he got caught too, President Trump, just uh the other day. He was in an interview. Maybe it was short-handed. I don't know who the interview was. I haven't watched the entirety of it. But he basically said we went to war for Israel again. So they say the quiet part out loud. And again, uh, you know, I'm opposed to us going to war for other countries. If we need to go to war to obviously defend the United States, national security, if you got me. I'm with you. But we're not seeing this right now. So Alex Jones to raise concerns about Tucker Carlson, obviously, about what's going on, being in the crosshairs now of the government's counterterrorism center. Okay, and what are we doing here? What are we gonna do? Go after people we don't like. And Gorka, I guess he made these remarks during an interview with Breitbar editor-in-chief, Alex Maslow. I don't know who that is. What asked about whether the newly revealed counterterrorism strategy covers right-wing extremists. So, what is Tucker Carlson doing that's right-wing extremist? I'm I'm very concerned about this. I mean, I listened to his show here and there. I haven't heard anything that he says that's extreme. I haven't heard anything like this. And by the way, you might like Tucker Carlson, what he says, you might not like it, but he's not an extremist. He's not a violent person. He's not advocating for violence. Now you might say something you disagree with, fine. So what? I've probably said something you disagree with too. But you know, every time I get behind this mic, I tell you what I think and why I think it. And I give you information about that. So I don't just make things up about the Iran war because I don't want us to be in the war. I give you information because this is what we're being told. This is the information I'm getting about the war. You know, I'd love to come behind the mic every day and say, hey, everything's great, folks. Hey, great economy, stock market's up, look at that. Dow's almost at 50,000. Look at that, great, everything's great. But we know the reality of it. Because I dig deep and I tell it to you. And you know you can count on me to do that. Okay, so there we go. Okay, Tucker Carlson too. He brings in people maybe you don't like, but at least he has a conversation. You can decide for yourself if you agree or disagree with it. Stop limiting yourself. Stop just saying you're in this group, this bubble, okay? Think for yourself, critically think. Use facts, use logic, look where we are. Do you see the economy booming right now? Of course you do. And it's very, very clear if you look around at what's going on. I was arguing with somebody online yesterday, I was talking about the energy crisis we're facing. And someone said, What energy crisis? I can't even have a conversation with this person. If you're unaware that the oil supply around the world, 31% of it, has basically been shut out, then uh you can't have a serious conversation with these people who will do anything at all to defend President Trump. Stop just defending people, start looking at the facts. That's all I gotta say on this. And by the way, it's ridiculous if they start targeting American pundits who are simply talking about what's going on and labeling them as right-wing domestic terrorists. It's just a stupid, stupid thing, in my estimation. All right. One more article, folks, before we hit our weekend. Let's look at this article. This is a good article. I like this one. In fact, I might give you my second article here. I have two more left. Let's see if I can break down both of them right now before we end today's show. The side of the gateway punn says Supreme Court unanimously rules freight brokers can be sued for negligently hiring illegal aliens and foreign truckers in a major 9-0 decision. Finally, the Supreme Court does something good. Unanimously, by the way. This should be something that Congress can agree on and should agree on, that this shouldn't be taking place right now. So freight brokers can be held personally liable now, and for negligence, hiring these dangerous trucking companies when they hire these unqualified foreign drivers who can't even speak English, let alone somehow getting these commercial driver's licenses where they can't even pass the regulations because they can't read the road sites. Well, this should be something we should all get behind, folks, because it affects each and every one of us. Do you really want to be driving next to somebody that has no idea what the signs mean on the streets? Or on the throughway or a freeway in the United States? I don't think anybody would. I don't think anybody would. And to her credit, Justice Barrett delivered the opinion versus, excuse me, in Montgomery versus Carib Transports, LLC, it says here, confirming that the federal law does not shield these greedy middlemen brokers from state negligence and their lawsuits. Very good on Amy Coney Barrett. Very good on the Supreme Court. Let's hold people accountable. That's how you prevent people from coming to the United States and breaking the law. I would hope so. And speaking on this issue, and again, it just relates to what we're talking about here, this is out of Breitbart News. And it says here that the Department of Homeland Security just announced this week that April marked the 12th consecutive months of zero releases of illegal aliens apprehended by Border Patrol at the Southwest border with Mexico and the United States. A major milestone, as officials say, that we have now secured the really the most secure border in American history under President Trump. So this is one of the areas Trump leads on. And again, I told you, I give Trump credit where it is due. This is a good thing. We don't want people released into the United States. We don't want this at all. We want a secure border. I want a complete border wall that is unable to be penetrated. I don't want to see this. I'm sick of seeing the holes dug or people traversing the border wall. I want that border wall so secure, just like Israel has with, unfortunately, with Gaza, they're in that open-air prison, as it's been called. And again, you can like it, don't like it, but again, they have a secure border. If a bird flies over in the fence, they can figure out exactly what it is at any given time. That's what we need here in the United States. We shouldn't be having this because we know the potential, the human trafficking, the weapons trafficking, the drug trafficking, all these other things that come across that border that shouldn't be coming in the United States, is a big problem. And we need to secure that. And we should be having that. So when DHS reports that a 94% drop in illegal border apprehensions compared to the Biden era, with daily crossings now lower than what agents encountered in a single hour at the height of the 2023 crisis. You know, this is a good thing. This is all good. This is all positive for the United States. And again, we should be again applauding the president when we are seeing very positive things, ladies and gentlemen, especially like this. We should demand these things. We should obviously look at things like national security and what have you. But we we need to obviously secure our southern border, and that should be something that we we can all get behind. So, ladies and gentlemen, I hope you enjoyed all that today. And obviously, I think again, we should say to ourselves when President Trump does good things, when things are obviously working to our benefit, uh, we should be very, very happy for these. Folks, thank you again for being today. I appreciate you so much. For some reason, my audio is not working today. I don't know why. I just updated my computer too. I think it has a lot to do with what's going on with my audio. So that'll do it for today's show, everybody. Thank you again for being here. I appreciate you so much. Make sure you're staying prepped with food, water, money, ammo, medicine, fuel, tools, anything in these times of uncertainty. Make sure you're staying prepped always. Enjoy the rest of your day. Have a great week, and I'll see you back here on Monday for more groundbreaking news on the next Marco Gerais show. Until then, be good. Stay busy. God bless each and every one of you.