United States

It seems that Trump's phone call with Taiwan's president Tsai Ing-wen as well a recent pair of tweets from the president-elect blasting China for devaluing their currency, taxing U.S. imports and military provocations in the South China Sea have served their purpose of ruffling some feathers in Beijing.

Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency (making it hard for our companies to compete), heavily tax our products going into..

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 4, 2016

Mallaby knives Greenspan following gold comments

Contributed by:  Sprott Money News

December 5th, 2016

Two years ago, Alan Greenspan humiliated America’s financial and political establishment by publicly highlighting the US dollar’s secondary role. "Gold is a currency,” Greenspan said, at a Council on Foreign Relations conference. “No fiat currency, including the (US) dollar, can match it."

President-elect Trump will have about 4,000 government positions to fill, including some of the most important posts in the US government. As CNN details below, cabinet positions require Senate confirmation, but other key posts are completely up to the discretion of the President.

So far 9 of the 16 'big' ones have been named...

The Chosen Few

Secretary of Defense

Gen. James Mattis
Retired Marine general

There’s a lot to be worried about going into 2017 both in terms of financial markets and in terms of geopolitical concerns.

Submitted by Jeffrey Snider via Alhambra Investment Partners,