Letter to Santa
Dear Santa… Please excuse my delay in reaching out.
With Christmas Eve just around the corner, I imagine your sleigh is loaded, your flight plan filed with the FAA, and your airspace coordination finalized with NORAD.
F-15s – in full afterburner! – escort Santa Claus. Courtesy the-ugliest-person-in-the-world-pic.blogspot.com/2023/01/santa-claus-aircraft.html
That’s why I’m opting for email instead of traditional mail. It’s quicker and simpler, plus you’ve been a Paradigm Press subscriber for ages, so we have your contact stored. However, I’m not the only one sending wishes—this letter goes out to about 98,000 other Morning Reckoning readers. No secrets, right?
I do have a small request for your Santa sack (more on that later). Yet, as per the Letters to Santa Form Manual (North Pole Publishing Co., 1996 ed.), I need to first demonstrate that I’ve been a decent person this year and merit more than just a lump of coal.
That said, as a geologist, I’m actually fine with receiving coal. I’d only ask that you specify the mine or geological source, so I can properly catalog it for my collection.
Anthracite coal from near Lehigh, Pennsylvania. BWK collection/photo.
Reflecting on 2025
One year ago, in December 2024, “President Joe Biden” still occupied the White House. And, Santa, you’re well aware that his mental faculties were seriously waning. The nation was effectively governed by the Deep State, a Washington, D.C. cabal focused on graft and the so-called “interagency consensus.” Biden was essentially controlled by a shadowy Committee of Governance managing operations behind closed doors, even handling the Autopen.
Within that setting, I anticipated the triumphant return of Donald Trump to the presidency, envisioning a relentless focus on all things Trump. In fact, during a conference in Baltimore last December, I likened the Man from Queens to a political supernova—a boundlessly energetic figure eager to be “the bride at every wedding, the corpse at every funeral.” (Yes, borrowed from Alice Longworth’s take on Theodore Roosevelt, but it fits perfectly.)
Trump 2.0 certainly lived up to expectations, although I was only joking about the “funeral” line—I definitely didn’t want visits from the Secret Service.
Now, a year later, Trump has undeniably shaken markets. Remember his inauguration address at the U.S. Capitol, where he floated ideas like reclaiming the Panama Canal, annexing Greenland, and turning Canada into the 51st state? Naturally, that ruffled feathers—especially in Ottawa, where they say “Elbows up.”
In April, Trump imposed asteroid-sized tariffs that wreaked havoc on markets. Domestically, he sparked TDS-fueled outrage with everything from golden decorations in the Oval Office to the new White House Ballroom and even slapping his name on the Trump-Kennedy Center. His foes aimed to erase him from history, yet he proceeded to reshape Washington’s architectural landscape.
On the international front, his handling of the European war involved defunding and neglect; in the Middle East, he authorized B-2 strikes on Iran; in Asia, he backed a trillion-dollar defense budget to deter conflict; and more recently, he directed U.S. forces to seize Venezuelan oil on the high seas. Indeed, the man has moved markets!
While these are political and cultural developments, at Paradigm Press my role is to assist readers in generating or safeguarding wealth amid turmoil. From the start of 2025, I predicted gold, silver, and platinum would soar. Despite Trump’s influence, the long-term downward trend of the dollar over the past fifty years remains unstoppable.
Some still label gold a “barbarous relic,” but remember—the barbarians ultimately destroyed Rome! Gold stands as the ultimate test of monetary policy’s truthfulness.
I also consistently forecast strong prospects for copper, rare earths, and critical metals like antimony and tungsten. These predictions weren’t simple calls; many savvy investors went against them. Yet my Paradigm colleagues and I consistently championed these sectors and wrote extensively about their potential.
This marks my 51st Morning Reckoning issue of the year, many of which focused on urging readers to invest in tangible assets, especially precious metals and scarce industrial materials. To share some data:
Gold started 2025 at $2,640/oz; today, it exceeds $4,500: a gain of over 70%.
Silver opened the year near $29/oz; it recently topped $70: an increase close to 142%.
Platinum began at $900/oz; now it’s over $2,200: up roughly 144%.
Copper was $3.00/lb early in 2025; it now trades above $5.55: approximately 85% higher.
Prices for tungsten and antimony are trickier to quantify due to chemical and market differences, but both metals more than doubled in 2025. Note that China wields massive control over these materials and could cut off supply almost instantaneously.
Rare earth metals also present valuation challenges because they encompass 17 elements. With China’s dominant industrial grip, Western entities like MP Materials (MP) and Ucore (UURAF) still performed well.
Speaking of that, Santa, did you catch our Paradigm Press summit in April at Jekyll Island, Georgia? I highlighted companies with huge upside potential, including…
Contango Ore (CTGO), an Alaskan gold miner trading around $13 at the time; today, it’s over $29. The company recently announced a merger with silver explorer Dolly Varden Silver (DVS). Both are excellent, future-oriented mining ventures.
Your editor last July, at Contango’s Johnson Tract site in Alaska. BWK photo.
I also highlighted Trilogy Metals (TMQ), trading near $1.50 back then. I expected the Trump administration to approve a road permit enabling development of a vast copper-lead-zinc deposit at Ambler. Sure enough, permit approval came in October, and shares have since tripled, now exceeding $4.80.
Additionally, I mentioned Ucore, which was priced around $0.80 at our summit and has climbed to approximately $4.40.
In 2025, I also recommended uranium producer Energy Fuels (UUUU), which has a strong rare earths focus and excellent management, based in southeast Utah. The stock surged from under $4 to roughly $15.50.
The Paradigm summit in October, held in Nashville, was another triumph for our team.
I won’t name names here, Santa, but those who tuned into the livestream heard about a high-grade antimony play in Slovakia, a promising Brazilian copper development company, and an astonishing helium project in northern Minnesota drilling billion-year-old rocks with substantial elemental helium yields. Truly remarkable.
So, if someone asks, “What have you done for me lately,” my answer is simple: “Sell some shares and pay the taxes.”
We Had Some Fun, Too
Of course, 2025 wasn’t all work, Santa. We enjoyed ourselves while guiding our readers through the markets and the world.
Do you recall my April 1st Morning Reckoning about my Navy days transporting that… ahem… rather unconventional… ahem… “item” from North Island, California to that… ahem… “place” in Nevada? As you well know from flying the Polar region, some tales former military Airedales can’t reveal publicly, even decades later—except maybe under April Fools’ plausible deniability.
Another standout article in 2025 was my July visit to Fairbanks, Alaska. We had breakfast at Soapy Smith’s, toured Kinross Gold (KGC) operations, then I explored a stunning antique auto museum featuring exceptional American cars from roughly 1900-1940.
Santa, the experience was pure gearhead eye candy, and it was fascinating to compare original car price tags to today’s values priced in gold. Readers sent plenty of enthusiastic feedback.
Another well-received piece detailed my dinner with Donald Trump, Jr. at a Florida energy conference. It was a special occasion, and I shared appropriately with our audience.
Your editor on the south coastline of Iceland, at “Diamond Beach,” holding ancient glacial ice. BWK photo.
Last fall’s trip to Iceland to meet academic colleagues and discuss geology and deep earth geophysics also left a strong impression. It shed light on tectonic forces driving ore deposit formation in Greenland (speaking of Greenland…). And 50,000-year-old ice tastes like… well… fresh water.
I could go on, but I believe you get the idea. Fundamentally, this work for Paradigm is about learning new things to better serve our subscribers with valuable insights.
The Christmas Wish
So, Santa, here is my single Christmas request, fully aligned with recent market trends:
Please advocate for indexing capital gains taxes to inflation, through Congress, the Treasury Department, or the IRS.
For context: selling assets held for a year or less triggers “short-term capital gains,” taxed similarly to ordinary income at rates from 10% to 37%. Those held longer qualify for “long-term capital gains,” typically subject to lower rates of 0% to 20% depending on income.
The problem now is inflation. Over the last five years, it has exceeded 30%. For example, an asset purchased for $1,000 five years ago effectively costs $1,300 today.
Suppose you sell it for $1,500. You’d owe 20% tax on the $500 gain, or $100, but in real terms, the true gain is only $200 ($1,500 minus $1,300). This means the tax acts like a 50% rate on real profit.
Indexing gains has been politically tricky for years, yet inflation was more contained since the 1980s. Now, inflation is persistent. President Trump inherited runaway spending and continues big expenditures, emulating prior administrations, while Congress struggles to pass budgets or cut spending. Thus, the dollar faces a shaky future—just a matter of severity and timing.
Price surges for gold, silver, copper, and others reflect not the elements themselves—they remain constant—but their value in dollars. The 2025 metals surge signals not only classic supply-demand dynamics but also declining worldwide confidence in the U.S. dollar and a broad repositioning of metals as wealth preservation vehicles.
This dollar decline will heavily influence 2026 and beyond, driving metal prices and mining stock valuations higher, much to shareholders’ satisfaction. But the underlying driver remains inflation.
Therefore, Santa, my Christmas wish is for capital gains to be indexed to inflation, sparing investors from what is essentially excessive taxation on real gains.
That’s all, Santa, except to thank you for reading. Also, if you’re available Monday afternoon (Eastern Time), January 19, 2026, all Morning Reckoning subscribers are invited to join a discussion on metals, mining, energy, and investment opportunities in Argentina and South America.
Our host will be our longtime friend Joel Bowman from Buenos Aires, with panelists including renowned hard assets expert Rick Rule, brilliant old Agora Financial associate Eric Fry, and of course, your humble editor.
Here’s the registration link for the January 19th “End of the World Summit.” Be sure to save the date.
Thank you again for reading, Santa. Wishing you a smooth Christmas Run and all the best for 2026.
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