The official propaganda insists the economy is “strong” because the stock market keeps reaching record highs — the same statistical magic every bubble uses before reality arrives with a bill. Wall Street floats higher while Main Street quietly learns the nutritional value of debt. According to the New York Fed, millions of Americans now struggle to afford food, but apparently food insecurity is less important than whether the S&P 500 feels optimistic this quarter. After printing trillions since 2020, policymakers inflated everything except real wages. Housing, rent, food, insurance, and basic survival costs exploded while asset owners became wealthier, and workers financed groceries with credit cards. Household debt now exceeds $18 trillion, proving that “consumer resilience” is simply the modern phrase for “people borrowing money to stay alive.”

https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2026/05/food-insecurity-and-consumer-pessimism/

As in Rome and Weimar, financial assets rise beautifully right until society underneath begins to crack.

🚨 THE IRAN WAR ISN’T JUST ABOUT OIL… IT’S ABOUT YOUR FOOD BILL 🚨

While politicians talk about “regional stability,” the real shockwave is already spreading through:

⛽️ Energy
🌾 Food
🚢 Shipping
💸 Inflation

Oil spikes don’t stay at the gas pump.
They hit fertilizers, transport, farming, supermarkets — EVERYTHING.
And while central bankers keep chanting “inflation is under control,” households are discovering that groceries now cost more than some monthly car payments. 🍞📈

This is how geopolitical chaos quietly becomes a global cost-of-living crisis.

Watch carefully:
The next inflation wave may not end on Wall Street…
It is coming to your kitchen. 🍽🔥

Learn to Earn with The Macro Butler Financial Academy: https://themacrobutler.com/financial-academy/

🤵 The Macro Butler Weekly Digest 🤵

🌐 How a once-in-a-generation climate event, a crippled fertilizer market, and fractured supply chains are conspiring to reshape what the world eats. 🌐

Read more here: https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-harvest-of-chaos

🚨 CHINA’S SECRET WEAPON ISN’T A MISSILE... IT’S SILVER 🚨

While everyone is watching the oil war, Beijing is quietly tightening its grip on the minerals that power:
⚡️ AI
🔋 Batteries
🛰 Defence Systems
☀️ Solar Panels

The next global conflict may not be fought with tanks...
It may be fought with supply chains. 🌍
The West spent decades outsourcing production.
China spent decades securing resources.

Now the bill is coming due.
💥 No minerals = No chips
💥 No chips = No AI
💥 No AI = No technological dominance
The real battlefield of the 21st century isn't only oil. It's who controls the metals that power the future.

Learn to Earn with The Macro Butler Financial Academy: https://themacrobutler.com/financial-academy/

Listen to a summary of The Macro Butler weekly newsletter via podcast on Substack; YouTube; Rumble; Spotify & TikTok.

https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-harvest-of-chaos-podcast

The latest PMI data from The Middle Kingdom suggest that Beijing is once again dusting off its favourite economic playbook: when growth slows, build something large. After a brief pause in April, construction activity rebounded despite the usual seasonal slowdown, signalling that fiscal stimulus and infrastructure spending are returning to centre stage. Beneath the surface, however, the picture is less impressive. Holiday spending received a temporary boost from May vacations and newly invented local spring breaks, proving once again that consumers spend more when they are not at work. Manufacturing activity slipped back to the 50-point dividing line between expansion and contraction, while weaker export orders reflected softer demand from overseas markets.

While exports remain a relative bright spot, policymakers appear increasingly likely to step up support through faster fiscal spending and additional monetary easing measures, including potential cuts to policy rates and reserve requirements. At the same time, inflation pressures linked to the Iran conflict eased modestly, with input and output prices retreating from recent highs. However, supply-chain conditions deteriorated slightly for the first time since the conflict began. As Confucius might have observed, when growth depends on pouring more concrete, one should be careful not to mistake construction activity for lasting prosperity.

In a nutshell, China's latest PMI data suggest that when growth slows, Beijing still reaches for its favorite stimulus tool: pour more concrete, cut a few rates, and hope scaffolding looks enough like prosperity.

🚨 CHINA ISN’T PLAYING CHESS ANYMORE… IT’S REDESIGNING THE BOARD 🚨

While the US is obsessed with spending US taxpayers’ dollars to defend the interest of a foreign country controlling its establishment, Beijing is busy building alliances, securing resources, and reshaping global trade routes.

🇨🇳 Minerals
🇨🇳 Energy
🇨🇳 Manufacturing
🇨🇳 Global Influence

The question is no longer whether China is rising.
The question is whether the West realizes the game has already changed.
⚠️ The biggest geopolitical shift of our lifetime is happening in plain sight.

Learn to Earn with The Macro Butler Financial Academy: https://themacrobutler.com/financial-academy/

Dear Investors,

Please find below the performance of The Macro Butler IG Portfolio as of end of May 2026.

https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-macro-butler-ig-portfolio-may-028

Dear Investors,

Please find below the performance of The Macro Butler Strategic Portfolio as of end of May 2026.

https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-macro-butler-strategic-portfolio-468

Dear Investors,

Please find below the performance of The Macro Butler Long/Short Portfolio as of end of May 2026.

https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-macro-butler-longshort-portfolio-376

🤵 The Macro Butler’s Monthly Meditation 🤵

🌐 Space is no longer science fiction. It is the new battlefield for power, resources, AI, satellites, semiconductors, and military dominance. 🌐

Read more here: https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/the-macro-butlers-monthly-meditation-d6c

To close out May and mark Vesak Day, The Macro Butler returned to Asharq Bloomberg to explain why the oil market has now exhausted virtually every price shock absorber — from massive Strategic Petroleum Reserve releases across the West to the sharp decline in crude imports by China’s teapot refiners.

While policymakers continue to sell the dream of lower energy prices, the reality is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore: global supply buffers are shrinking, inventories are tightening, and the next major move in oil is higher, not lower.

https://themacrobutler.substack.com/p/interview-with-asharq-bloomberg-tv-388

The ISM Manufacturing PMI rose to 54.0 in May, its highest level in four years, proving once again that nothing says "economic resilience" quite like stockpiling goods before the next round of inflation arrives. New orders and production accelerated as companies rushed to secure supplies while oil prices, shipping costs, and raw material expenses remained elevated thanks to the Middle East conflict. Nearly every manufacturing sector expanded, even as survey respondents complained about soaring fuel costs, supply-chain disruptions, and shrinking margins. In other words, manufacturers are still buying today because they are increasingly worried about what everything will cost tomorrow. The good news is that demand remains strong. The bad news is that inflation appears equally determined to participate in the recovery.

In a nutshell, U.S. manufacturing surged to a four-year high as companies rushed to buy today what they fear will cost much more tomorrow.

In a reassuring display of voluntary government oversight, Donald Copperfield signed an executive order allowing AI companies to submit their most advanced models to Washington for review before public release. The arrangement is entirely optional, of course—much like many things that eventually become mandatory. Under the order, frontier AI models may be shared with a growing collection of federal agencies tasked with protecting the public from the risks created by the very technologies they are increasingly eager to monitor. A new AI cybersecurity clearinghouse will scan models for vulnerabilities, while the Pentagon and other agencies accelerate efforts to deploy AI-powered defensive tools of their own.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/06/promoting-advanced-artificial-intelligence-innovation-and-security/