In recent decades, China built its economy on heavy state investment in export-oriented manufacturing industries. Those investments created large numbers of jobs for low-skilled people flooding China’s fast-growing cities. But China seems to have over-invested, leaving a glut of capacity in the heavy industrial sector that has forced plants to cut prices deeply. The low prices mean those factories are effectively operating at a loss subsidized by the state.

China has long said that over time it plans to shift from an export-driven economy to one that relies more heavily on internal consumption. Now, with the global economy slowing, China really has no choice. There simply is not enough external demand elsewhere around the globe for China to export its way back to the high levels of growth it achieved over the last few decades.

Of course, the risks and ramifications don’t rest solely with China. Countries as varied as Brazil and Australia are large suppliers of crucial raw materials, such iron ore and coal, for China’s industrial sector. They’ve been faced with steep declines in the price of those commodities. Brazil’s economy has sunk into a deep recession, in part due to its weak export sector.

But it highlights the fact that both Russia and NATO are still in the position to unleash global-scale nuclear attacks - and the weapons are armed and ready. Designed to be basically unstoppable, intercontinental thermonuclear missiles could destroy cities on the far side of the globe in minutes - and bring about instant, catastrophic change to our world

The Arms Control Association says, ‘United States and Russia still deploy more than 1,500 strategic warheads on several hundred bombers and missiles - far more than necessary to deter nuclear attack - and they are modernizing their nuclear delivery systems. If these weapons were used even in a “limited” way, the result would be catastrophic nuclear devastation.’

Back in August 2012, when negative interest rates were still merely viewed as sheer monetary lunacy instead of pervasive global monetary reality that has pushed over $6 trillion in global bonds into negative yield territory, the NY Fed mused hypothetically about negative rates and wrote “Be Careful What You Wish For” saying that “if rates go negative, the US Treasury Department’s Bureau of Engraving and Printing will likely be called upon to print a lot more currency as individuals and small businesses substitute cash for at least some of their bank balances.”

However, just because negative rates have not been passed on to savers yet or just because cash still has not been made illegal, that doesn’t mean it won’t be. The question at this point is twofold: what happens after the savings of ordinary depositors in the bank are officially taxed and/or cash becomes phased out, and more importantly, what happens just before. In other words, will there be a run on physical cash?

The truth is that if society panics and there is a full blown rush out of existing electronic bank deposits and into physical currency to avoid negative rate taxation, only those who panic first will be safe. Why? Because of the “magic” of fractional reserve banking – there is simply not enough physical currency in circulation to satisfy all savers’ claims.

Are you giving away too much information? Here’s a few things Mark Zuckerberg’s network can guess about you…

Facebook knows when you are asleep or awake

Many of us check Facebook late at night AND early in the morning - Social Skinny says 50% of 18-24-year-olds check Facebook before doing anything else in the morning.

Facebook knows who you’ve given your mobile number to

If you’ve ever put your mobile number on your Facebook profile – something FB is keen for you to do if you upload pictures from mobile – you can find yourself being recommended as a friend to people who have that number in their contacts.

By default, people can search for you using your number as soon as you add it to your profile.

Facebook knows where you’ve been

If you’ve ever used the Facebook feature ‘Nearby Friends’, Facebook will store a record of exactly where you’ve been, using your smart device’s GPS or Wi-Fi location services.

It will also broadcast your approximate location to anybody else on your Friends list who has the feature enabled - which, as you have no way of controlling this, could be anyone.

Facebook knows if you’re straight or gay

A University of Cambridge study found that it’s possible to guess a person’s sexuality with a high degree of accuracy, based simply on their Facebook ‘Likes’.

Facebook knows if you have children - even if you don’t tell it

Even if you don’t explicitly TELL Facebook your relationship status, the network can make a guess at it based on your posts and Likes. Facebook stores information related to familly on your Ad Preferences page - where you can see what Facebook thinks it ‘knows’ about you.

Facebook knows who you’ve been stalking

If you’ve ever repeatedly searched for a person’s name, Facebook will remember and store this information - and the next time you search when logged in, it will predict your most common searches. This data can be quite private - and embarrassing.

In a day of unprecedented migrant violence thousands of refugees smashed down a border fence between Macedonia and Greece whilst inhabitants of the Calais Jungle camp set fires and hurled rocks at police as they attempted to avoid eviction.

Refusing to put a limit on the number of refugees entering her country, Angela Merkel defiantly told state broadcaster ARD: “Sometimes, I also despair. Some things go too slow. There are many conflicting interests in Europe. But it is my duty to do everything I can so that Europe finds a collective way.” That stance has put Germany at loggerheads with its close neighbour Austria, which has announced a cap on daily asylum applications in a desperate bid to stop the flow of migrants.

Today the country ratcheted up its attacks on Mrs Merkel to new heights, calling on her to fly migrants directly from Greece to Germany to alleviate the pressure on countries located between the two. The migrant crisis continued to unravel after Hungary announced its own plans to build a huge border fence on the frontier with Romania which will effectively seal off northern Europe from the Balkans.

No-nonsense Prime Minister Viktor Orban ignored pleas from Brussels to drop his radical plans to reduce migration, insisting he was acting as a defender of Christian Europe. He said: "We will teach Brussels, the human traffickers and the migrants that Hungary is a sovereign country. We cannot solve the demographic problems of the undeniably dwindling and ageing European population with the Muslim world without losing our lifestyle, security and ourselves. Those coming here have no intention of adapting to our lifestyle."

Of course the goal of any invasion would be regime change in Syria, and that is something that the Syrian army, Iran, Hezbollah and Russia are simply not going to allow. So what the US government, Saudi Arabia and their allies are contemplating could literally be the spark that sets off World War III. I was stunned earlier today when I came across the following quote from Saudi Arabia’s defense minister. Saudi Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri told Reuters that the 49 defense ministers that had gathered in Brussels a couple of weeks ago had openly discussed the need to conduct a large scale ground invasion of Syria…

An aide to Saudi Arabia’s defense minister said on Monday, meanwhile, that defense ministers from the US-led coalition against Islamic State had discussed the possibility of a Syrian ground incursion two weeks ago in Brussels. “It was discussed at the political level but it wasn’t discussed as a military mission,” Saudi Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri told Reuters. “Once this is organized, and decided how many troops and how they will go and where they will go, we will participate in that.”

Saudi Arabia and Turkey still appear to be quite determined to get rid of Assad. So we should not expect this current “ceasefire” to last for long. In the coming days we should expect the western powers to accuse Russia, Iran, Hezbollah and the Syrian government of repeatedly violating the ceasefire, and these “violations” will be used as justification for whatever “the coalition” has planned next. Sadly, whatever they have planned next could be the spark that plunges our planet into World War III.

In an interview with The Telegraph, Mr Johnson warned that David Cameron’s “emergency brake” on migrant benefits will do nothing to reduce the numbers of foreigners coming to the UK. In his first detailed comments since announcing that he was backing a “Brexit”, the Mayor of London hailed the "extraordinary" response of Eurosceptic MPs and said he will try to encourage ministers to change their mind and back the out campaign.

The Prime Minister has hailed his offer of a four-year "emergency brake" on benefits and suggested that it will reduce the "pull factors" for EU migrants. However, critics have warned that it will have little effect because it is tapered, meaning that migrants gradually gain more access to Britain's benefits system the longer they stay in the UK.

"There is only one way to get the change we need, and that is to vote to go, because all EU history shows that they only really listen to a population when it says No."

He highlighted the contribution of Altiero Spinelli, a political theorist and former European Commissioner, to the founding to the EU. “It’s worth knowing something here that the public needs to understand … the European Union is not about the trade issue,” Mr Duncan Smith told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show.

“The EU was set up by the founding fathers, an important man called [Altiero] Spinelli, an Italian, who was an ex-communist, he designed the Maastricht Treaty and the Single European Act, why? He said because this is a political project, bringing the nations of Europe closer and closer together to create a place called Europe and the design of this was such that politicians who come and go could not actually override this decision of the bureaucracy because otherwise we would never get there.”

The late Mr Spinelli is one of 11 officially recognised founding fathers of the European Union; others include former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who called for the creation of a United States of Europe. The Italian politician joined the Italian Communist Party in the 1920s to fight Benito Mussolini’s fascist dictatorship, which ruled Italy at the time.

The American government issued an unusually stark warning of the horrors that face Iraq if the dam gives way, describing a "tsunami-like wave" that would crush nearly a third of the country. Iraq's power grid could be entirely knocked out and parts of major cities would be underwater for weeks like areas of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, the US said. The Iraqi government would be unable to direct an evacuation because Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) still controls much of the territory near the dam and so people need to prepare to evacuate on their own, the US said.

The dam was built in 1984 but has fallen into severe disrepair over decades of dictatorship, war and instability in Iraq. The government has struggled to convince foreign companies to take up a contract to maintain the dam while fighting with Isil rages nearby. The US embassy in Baghdad said long-running deterioration meant the danger was now at an "unprecedented" level. While there was "no specific information that indicates when a breach might occur", the US said Iraq's government should begin setting up an emergency notification system to warn the roughly 1.5 million people in the flood path.

But it’s only the beginning, explains Auryn Resources executive chairman Ivan Bebek in an interview with SGT Report, as nation states and large investors are trying to get their hands on gold as fast as they can. We know for a fact that the smart money including major global players like George Soros and Carl Icahn are gobbling up all the gold they can get their hands on. When the rush for the exit in global equities starts – and you better believe it will – there will be an equally panicked rush into safe haven assets.

And while there is most certainly big money moving into gold ahead of negative interest rates, a potential ban on high denomination cash bills and the global calamity to come, Bebek highlights the fact that retail investors haven’t yet begun to get involved on any meaningful scale. Many remain committed to the view of mainstream financial pundits and entrenched analysts talking their books, so they’re going to hold on to their more traditional investments until such time that they see everyone else panic. And when that inevitable rush to the exit door comes they’ll be looking to shift their capital into safe haven assets, along with the rest of the herd.

But just as there will be only one exit door for the mob trying to sell, there will also be a small entrance way for those looking to protect themselves with gold.