The speculation over tariffs on imported metal became reality on Saturday, when the Trump administration announced sweeping 25% tariffs on both Mexico and Canada, set to take effect on Tuesday.

The U.S. stock market is sinking this morning on the news, but gold and silver are up. There is a reasonable likelihood that gold and silver prices will head higher still – along with premiums on coins, bars, and rounds.

While the headlines scroll by and the reform effort enters full swing, there is one quasi federal institution which has somehow dodged pretty much all accountability for more than a century.

The infamous Trouble Asset Relief Program (TARP) provided about $650 billion to the shady banks behind the 2008 Financial Crisis. The bankers responsible wrote and then resold NINJA (No Income No Job) loans and were richly rewarded, even as Americans at large suffered through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Through that monetization mechanism along the setting of short-term interest rates below the true market price, the Federal Reserve is also responsible for the catastrophic decline in the purchasing power of the U.S. dollar.

The lack of oversight must have been encouraging to bankers who seem only to have grown more brazen.

Wells Fargo was found guilty of creating phony new accounts for clients and sticking them with extra fees. Traders at JPMorgan Chase and other banks were convicted of rigging the silver markets. The rap sheet is long and terrible, yet the Fed never suspends a major banks’ trading privileges or access.

The awful truth is these offenses are just what we know about. Not once in its 112-year history has the Fed undergone a complete audit of its activities and expenditures.

America’s central bank is even less accountable than the CIA. It does not provide a comprehensive report of activities to the president or to Congress, and its officials fight vigorously to avoid oversight whenever it comes up.

This week’s Market Update was authored by Money Metals Director Clint Siegner.

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