Two-Thirds of America Is Cutting Back

Wednesday, May 27, 2026

Freedom First

Dear Reader,

THE MARKET IS AT ALL-TIME HIGHS.

That is what CNN told you this morning. What they did not tell you: 2 out of 3 Americans are cutting back on their spending. Right now. Today. While the S&P 500 celebrates a new record.

I have seen this movie before. I know how it ends.

When the stock market is flying and Main Street is tightening its belt, that is not prosperity. That is a tale of two economies. And one of them is lying.

In Today’s Issue

• The stunning survey that proves the market has nothing to do with your wallet

• How Micron just crossed $1 trillion while your neighbor cancels subscriptions

• The 1929 parallel Wall Street hopes you have forgotten

• Brownstone Research: Elon Musk’s SpaceX AI Play. Here is how to get positioned before the IPO.

Let me give you the exact numbers.

The Associated Press reported it straight: “As US stock market hits new highs, 2 of 3 Americans are cutting back on spending.”

Not some fringe outlet. The Associated Press.

At the same moment, Micron Technology crossed $1 trillion in market cap. Wall Street popped champagne. The S&P 500 hit a fresh record. CNBC anchors beamed.

Meanwhile: two thirds of the people watching that broadcast are canceling Amazon Prime, skipping dentist appointments, and choosing between groceries and gas.

This is not a healthy economy. This is a financialized economy. There is a difference.

A healthy economy: wages rise, prices stay manageable, people save, businesses hire. Stocks reflect real growth in real production.

A financialized economy: the Fed prints money, that money flows into assets, asset prices go up, the people who own assets get richer, everyone else gets squeezed. The numbers look great on paper. They feel terrible in real life.

Which one are we living in?

Look at the numbers:

• S&P 500: all-time high

• Micron market cap: $1 trillion and climbing

• 2 in 3 Americans: cutting spending

• US national debt: closing in on $37 trillion

• Iran war: US strikes ongoing as markets celebrate

We are fighting a war in the Middle East. The market does not care. Iran condemns our strikes as a “show of force.” The Dow goes up.

I studied history for 50 years. I know what this pattern looks like.

October 1929. Stocks were at record highs right up until they were not. The Roaring Twenties felt exactly like this. Rich getting richer. Average people borrowing to keep up. The illusion holding together just long enough for the insiders to exit.

Then it fell 89 percent. It took 25 years to recover.

I am not saying the crash happens tomorrow. I am saying the 2-in-3 number is the tell. When most people are already pulling back, the consumer economy is already weakening. The stock market always finds out last.

There is one number that connects everything I just told you, and it is the one the financial media refuses to put on screen.

The number is $36.9 trillion.

That is the US national debt. Every single dollar of stock market gain, every Micron milestone, every record close has been purchased on that credit card. The bill has not come due yet. But it will.

My poor dad believed in the system. He trusted the numbers on television. He thought a booming market meant a healthy country.

My rich dad asked a different question: where did the money come from?

When the answer is “the Federal Reserve printed it,” that is not wealth. That is a transfer. Someone somewhere is getting poorer so the market can hit a new record. That someone is the 2 in 3 Americans cutting back on spending right now.

So what do you do?

You get out of paper. Paper dollars lose value every time the Fed acts. Paper stocks reflect an economy running on debt. Paper is a promise from people who have broken every promise they ever made.

GOLD does not care about the Fed. Silver does not care about Micron’s market cap. Bitcoin does not care what CNBC says.

The people who own real assets will be fine when this resolves. The people holding paper will not understand what happened until it is already over.

I bought my first gold coin in 1972. I have been buying silver since before most of your readers were born. I am not guessing. I am watching the same movie I watched in the 1970s, with a bigger budget and better special effects.

The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent. But 2 in 3 Americans cutting back on spending tells me the real economy already knows what the stock market has not yet priced in.

Get liquid. Get real. Get out of paper before the paper crowd figures it out.

Pigs get fat. Hogs get slaughtered.

To your freedom,
Robert Kiyosaki

P.S. The stock market hits record highs. Two thirds of Americans are cutting back. That gap does not close quietly. If you want to understand exactly how to position your money before it does, my team at The Kiyosaki Letter put together a full playbook. It covers the assets that protect you when paper promises break. Click here to see the Patriot Income Plan.