In today’s episode, Kip dives into a whirlwind of market moving news and keen insights at the start of a new year. You’ll hear a fast-paced analysis of the recent dramatic developments in Venezuela, the implications for global power dynamics, and why these international events are driving opportunities in gold, silver, and bitcoin. Kip reflects on the VRA portfolio’s strong performance outpacing the market yet again and shares why he believes 2026 could be a record breaking year for investors. You’ll get his perspective on the “Trump Doctrine,” which he argues is reshaping economic and geopolitical realities, especially in the Western Hemisphere. Tune into today's podcast to learn more.

Don’t look back because the market is closed. Good Monday afternoon everyone. Kip Herriage here with the daily VRA investing podcast. Hope you had a good day today. Hope your new year is off to a great start. Going to move pretty quickly here today. We’ve got a lot of things going on and here at the office and I’ve got about 20 minutes to knock this out. Let’s move fast today.

But I do want to talk about obviously what happened in Venezuela. What was a remarkable, I mean I don’t even know if I’ve got the right adjectives for this. The way they pull this off, the Trump administration combined with what he did in Iran. I gotta tell you, if I am Colombia, if I am Cuba, the leaders of these countries again, Iran’s already seen firsthand and now China and Russia, I’d be sleeping a little bit nervously. Gotta tell you the truth about it because this is Trump consolidating strength. That’s what this is, consolidating strength in the Western hemisphere and beyond because they, we know that the, the battle long term is China. It’s us versus China. But as I cover this morning in our letter, China’s paper tiger.

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This is what Trump knows full well. It’s a communist country. Communist countries are not hard to topple. And look, they’ve already got you know, debt to GDP that’s REDES like it’s 3 better than 301 death to G better 300 death GDP again we’re, we’re at 120. This is a point that I’ve made for a very long time. For those that are hyper focused on the debt level we have here, it’s nothing compared to China, it’s nothing compared to Japan. Matter of fact, according to those two countries, we don’t have enough debt. And I know I say that and people are like what are you smoking, Kip? You cannot be serious.

And I think that I’m going to come back to the point that we’ve been making it with you now since Trump was reelected because we can continue to hear rumblings the things are going to, things are going to happen on the world stage with respect to a new monetary policy that’s going to involve gold, it’s going to involve bitcoin, it’s going to involve silver, maybe other assets as well to, to back long term treasury bond issuance in the US that will bring our rates down to about 2%. This is what I keep hearing, this is what I think is going to happen and I think it’s another big reason that we’re seeing these blast off moves. Higher in gold and now silver as well of course which we, we believe will continue. Matter of fact highly, highly confident call here. That move will continue this year as well as bitcoin. You know we told you starting about two weeks ago that bitcoin is putting in a very, a positive looking consolidation pattern today. Up better than 3% 94, 100. Remember the all time high is 126 folks.

It won’t take but about I don’t know a month to get back to those prices. When bitcoin moves, you know it moves well. And a point that I made last week I’ll make again here today for bitcoin I’m again and jump around a little bit but I want to make sure I cover these points. Bitcoin’s only had five down years since 2011 which really when it, when it started becoming a known quantity. Every year that is it’s had a down year. It’s been followed by a, an up year. It’s five out of five times with an average gain the following year of 117%. So again we’re very, very bullish on bitcoin.

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Bitcoin’s been good to us over the, over the last seven, eight years. We first purchased it in 2017 and the portfolio at 2000 and we’ve made better than 2200% returns than it had two trades in it. Now we’re back long and strong again. But again like the chart pattern of bitcoin, we have other interests there as well. If you’re with us as a very member, you know what those are. If you’re not, come and join us. Start the new year right. Join us@vrainsider.com again vrainsider.com and also put this out there.

Now 2025 was a not just a good year for the markets, not a great year, but it was a good year. NASDAQ led the way up 20% just better than SB 500 up 16%. Dow Jones up. Right. I’m rounding up here. 13 Rust 2000 up just over 11%. But the VR portfolio came in with a return of 35.7%. That marks 19 of 22 years that the BRE portfolio has beaten the market.

Something we’re pretty proud of here. And our top winners we had one up 251, one up 250. Both gold miners one up 258 silver of course we’re long and strong from $5 an ounce. Silver finished up 144 for the year. They weren’t all up, no doubt about it. But I will tell you, since this bull market started, here are returns. The last for the last three years, 2023, we’re up 50.3%. 2024, up 27.1%.

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And then last year again, 2025, up 35.7%. And now the focus is of course it never stops, right? It’s like the mail, it never stops coming. So our goal now is once again to beat Mr. Market because Mr. I can promise you this, Mr. Market, this is my mentor used to tell me, Ted Parsons, Mr. Market wants to crush us. Mr.

Market wants to get everybody on the same side of a, of an investment, same side of the market and pull the proverbial rug. That’s, that’s really frankly our biggest concern coming into this year is that out of 21 market strategists that were surveyed by Bloomberg, this was reported last week. All 21 are bullish on 2026. That is a concern I will tell you. Don’t like being part of the majority. Makes me very anxious as a matter of fact, as opposed to for the previous three years where nobody was bullish. That made it very easy for us, right? But I think again the distinction we started making last week with you is that it’s one thing to say you’re bullish, it’s another thing altogether to actually be bullish. And you look, we’re going to get shakeouts, right? Every bull market has them.

We’ll have them this year. That that wasn’t today by the way. We’ll have shakeouts this year as well. And we know what to look for. We know what to look for. That happens with the semis start leading lower instead of higher. That’s not happening now, is it? Semi another all time high today as, as was the stock stock market all time highs. It’s semi’s all time high today.

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The semi desk 100, the single most important relative string chart that we follow, it just continues to flash full on buy signals which means the market’s going to continue higher when, when the semis and bitcoin turn lower together. That is a bearish warning sign. So we look for that. We look for the percent of stocks above the 50 and 200 day moving average and other leadership names and groups that we look at. But, but right now again, based on our VRA investing system and based on our move momentum oscillators, we got room to run. We have room to run the shakeout we had it in December removed a lot of the overbought nature of this market. And now these charts look very good again. The VRA system is right now 10 out of 12 screens bullish.

And that is back up the truck territory, which is what we continue to do. That’ll change at some point. We’ll let you know when it is. We think it’s going to be a very active year for the very portfolio as far as our leveraged ETF trading program where we’ve, we’ve done, we’ve done quite well over the last decade with these and it’s kind of the bread and butter of what we do here at the VRA. And of course our growth stocks in our 10 baggers, we’re position builders. We believe in, in building positions using monthly dollar cost averaging and just letting the gains compound each and every year. Again, if you got the right growth stock, if nothing changes, the management team still in place, if the company is still growing, it’s still meeting all of our, you know, minimum requirements, if you will, then why would you sell it and why would you have to sell it and pay gain, pay tax gains on that? You know, we, we are, we like holding our long term investments as long term as possible and letting the gains compound. We’re very excited about the portfolio we have in place now in the vra.

But I do think it’s going to be an active trading year. I think we’re going to have massive swings higher to where we get to extreme overbought levels and that’s just when we’re going to be taking profits. That’s what we do in our, in our ETFs. And then on those pullbacks, we’ll be looking to get long again. I think it’s gonna be an active trading year from that point of view for the VRA portfolio. But again, it was a good year and we’re looking forward to doing it again this year with you in 2026. Of course, the big news over the weekend was Saturday morning’s raid in Venezuela taking out Maduro, who, who pleaded not guilty. Today during his sentencing, excuse me, during his sentencing, his plea of not guilty, he said, look, I’m a good guy and I’m still the president of Venezuela.

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I don’t know that either of those are true. He didn’t win the election, first of all. He strong armed it and basically stole an election, number one. And number two, he’s an ARCO terrorist. This is going to go, I think very much like what we saw with Manuel Noriega in Panama. And I think there’s a, not a snowball’s chance in hell that that Maduro is going to, is going to get out of this. And now we’re seeing what is really the Trump, Trump Doctrine. We’ve been talking with you about this for the last year, but matter of fact, I wrote my first piece on this in December of 2024, just after Trump was, was re, was reelected for the second time, where I explained what the Trump Doctrine was.

And that is we’re going to grow the United States to such a, a degree of strength and, and speed. Right? GDP growth, corporate earnings growth. We’re seeing all this play out now that the rest of the world is going to be challenged to keep up with us. And in our hemisphere, in the Western Hemisphere, if you don’t work with us, well, the Trump Doctrine is going to take over and we’re just going to remove you from power if that’s what needs to happen. Again, the big concern we have, again, we’re not fans of George W. Bush and what happened, of course, with Iraq and Afghanistan, 9, 11, etc. Patriot act, right? So we don’t want to see boots on the ground. It almost certainly is going to mandate some boots on the ground here.

But look, so far, so good. What Trump has done, not losing a single person or aircraft, both in Iran and now in Venezuela as well, is utterly remarkable. That is a testament to the strength and the massive abilities of the US Military. So God bless our servicemen and women. Let’s hope that boots on the ground doesn’t mean what it’s been in the past. I don’t think it’s going to. I really don’t. Trump, remember who he is.

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He doesn’t like this. He doesn’t want to see our men and women fighting. He’s. He likes peace, but he also understands that sometimes it’s peace through strength. And that’s what I think we’ve seen both in Iran and in Venezuela. But I think the thing with Venezuela, to me, is just the massive amount of wealth that’s being squandered in this country, through the country going hardcore socialist, communist. And of course, I mean, the primary allies are Russia, China, Iran, not exactly great friends in the United States, but they’re in our hemisphere. And that’s just something that cannot be allowed to continue.

And Trump has put his foot down on this. I think, again, as I said at the beginning of the podcast today, I think a lot of global leaders are pretty nervous about this, as they should be. And I think if you’re closer to home, for example, if you’re. I’ll just mention two countries. If you’re Colombia, you’re probably next. Again, narco terrorism not happening in our hemisphere. That’s. If you have a problem with this, then I would say that you probably are a little tone deaf to the parents in this country that have lost children to fentanyl and other drugs.

We’re talking about in the hundreds of thousands. Right. Just in the last five years, hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost due to the scourge of drugs in the United States. Hardcore drugs in the United States. Right. And that just can’t be allowed to go on. Is there risk with this policy? Sure there is. But again, Colombia, you may be next.

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Get your act together. Number two, Cuba. Look, Cuba is one of the most gorgeous countries on the planet and is 30 miles off the coast of Florida. What a great vacation place this would be for all of us. Right. I think that we’re about to see, I think massive change is coming in Cuba next. I think it’s in the near term and I think that maybe within the next two or three years, you and I might be able to do some vacationing there, maybe buy some property there. I would say that serious money right now is looking to go long.

Cuban real estate. And so I think again, there’s always opportunity, right? And this is the way this, the, the smart money thinks. But I think all of this is combined with Venezuela again, more oil reserves than anywhere on the planet. 18% of global oil reserves in, in Venezuela. Same thing with natural gas. Something like 200 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Get a lot of gold, a lot of silver, a lot of important rare earth minerals and elements. And now this wealth is not.

It will no longer be squandered, hopefully. And, and now this country can get back to what I mean. This country used to be a paradise, you know, and now it’s just nothing but a humanitarian crisis as it’s gone through economic collapse after economic collapse with unbelievable levels of hyperinflation. Right. So good thing under the Venezuelan people seem very happy about this. And again, so far so good. I again, I think, I think it’s the Trump doctrine and I think we have to keep trusting on this as he can consolidate strength the Western hemisphere so we can take on our ultimate enemies of China, Russia, Iran, etc. Etc.

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And to do it economically, that’s how you beat these guys. You beat them economically and you force change. Either they change or they shrivel up and die. That’s the Trump Policy. That’s the Trump doctrine. And again, I am very, very in favor of what we’ve seen so far. What else today? Look, you know, you know our, you know our beliefs about this bull market. We’ve been saying now for three years, this is a, the key that I think so many are still missing here is that this is a structural bull market.

Structural. It’s not, this market is not being driven by hype. It’s not being driven by, it’s not led by speculation. This is a structural bull market. I’m not even talking about AI. I’m not even talking about the innovation revolution. I’m talking about the structural strength of the United States, both from a corporate point of view and from an individual point of view. Again, we always talk about the second America.

Again, I’m from the third America, I get it. But the second America may not be doing that great. First America has never been stronger. Corporate America has never been stronger. All the data backed us up. We’ve been sharing this with you for three years now after writing our book the Big Bribe. And again, for our new folks, I just have to repeat this because there’s no one talking about this. I was on Charles Payne show last week and I brought this up again and I just, I would like to hear the, anybody in the media, please repeat these facts because they are facts.

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40% of Americans have no mortgage. These are against all time highs. The average home equity across America is 70%. Again, another all time high, $35 trillion in home equity. All we need are lower interest rates and a stable economy so people can start going. You know what, maybe it is okay to take out some home equity. This is what people normally do to, to buy another home, right? Let your, let your equity work for you or to refurbish your home you live in now or maybe send your kids to college or maybe take, you know, maybe take 50, $100,000 out of your home equity and put it in the stock market where you can beat your level of interest you’d be paying in your home, which we think is going to be in the 4, 4.5% range to this year. And again, if we’re right about the markets, we’re looking at returns of 30% plus here this year.

That’s S & P 500. Nasdaq we think could jump maybe 50% this year. Again, we’re on record, we’ve been saving out for two months. A lot of people starting to catch up with this. That’s fine. But again, it’s a structural bull market. That just happens to have combined with it the Trump economic miracle, the innovation revolution, an absolute ocean of liquidity. Corporations barely have any debt at all.

Again, 50 year lows of debt to GDP, excuse me, market cap to GDP. For corporate America, this is the roaring 2020s. We told you this at the beginning of 2020 that we thought this was going to happen. It is happening. It’s time to get on board, folks. Don’t, don’t let this train, don’t let this train leave you behind. Don’t miss the train. All right? Because this we saw today at the markets.

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Did we not again, all time high. We, we didn’t. The first, the second Santa Claus rally did not happen. Right. The first, the last five days of the year and the first two days of the new year. We did not get a positive outcome for this 500 all time highs, but didn’t get. The Santa Claus rally is positive. Not that that’s a big deal.

It’s. We’d like to see it happen. Sure. Because when that happens, when the first five days of January are higher and when January is higher, you have, you know, analytics that tell you it’s going to be pretty remarkable year. Does it? Doesn’t mean we have to have it. By the way, it’s the third year in a row the Santa Claus rally has failed to finish positive. So it hasn’t stopped this last couple years, has it? But again, we think because it’s a structural market and there’s just so much behind this market and now we’ve got the innovation revolution that is going to absolutely blow people away. Over the weekend, Elon Musk tweeted out, the singularity has arrived.

The singularity has arrived where the level of change is going to take place at such a rapid pace that it’s not even possible to track it. This is why you have very smart people. I’m not talking about us, but this is what we’ve been saying as well. It’s a very smart people like an Elon Musk. Right. And others. Kathy Arc. Kathy.

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My God, we talk about it all the time. I can’t remember her name. One of those days. Um, I know your author screaming at me. I apologize. Of course the minute I finish this podcast, it’ll, it’ll come back to my mind. But again, very smart. Elon Musk is saying we’re gonna have, we could have GDP growth of, of 20, 30, 40, 50% a year.

That’s the kind of growth he’s talking about from the singularity. And what’s happening with AI. And again, this is so much more than just about AI and an artificial intelligence, meaning it’s so much more than just about the technology of space. This is about every industry growing. And with new inventions, I think we’re going to see some very, very cool things discovered. Again, primarily because AI, all right, that’s the singularity that will be taking place over the next one, two, three years. And we, we fully intend to be part of this very exciting 2020s because that’s really what it’s been. Well again, we think it’s just picking up, it’s just now really starting to pick up speed.

But again, don’t let the train leave you behind. Don’t miss the train. If you’re listening to people that are really negative, if you listen to people that are, I don’t know, can’t get out of their own way, all they can do is be a pessimist. It might be a good time to consider listening to somebody else because that’s, that’s, that’s the conviction that we have about this bull market again today. Big, big gains today following the Venezuela operation. Dow Jones today up 1.2%. Rusty,000 up 1.6%. We think small caps are going to have a stellar 2026 SPF 100 today is our laggard of 17th of percent.

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Same with NASDAQ but again the key, the semis SMH. The semi ETF up 1.3% today. When the semis are leading, that’s what they’re doing right now. The charts show it. Then you must be long and strong. It’s the biggest buy signal that there is. And again we’ll let you know when we start hitting overbought levels. All right, let’s take a look under the hood today.

Very good internals today. Excuse me. Let’s see what happened. Gold and silver. Wow, big moves today. Again today. The internals are fantastic as well. Advanced decline was just better than 2 to 1 for both NYSE and NASDAQ.

Volume also solidly positive today. 70.8% on NASDAQ positive. 66.8% positive on the YSA and a big 502 stocks hitting a 52 week high to just 103 hitting a 52 week low. Sector watch not, not a lot happened here. It was positive though. Seven sectors higher, four lower. Let it be upside by energy again. Energy stocks did very well.

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Oil prices may have struggled early. Did finish positive today. But energy stocks is of course hyper bullish for them. They’ll be the ones Doing the work in Venezuela, getting their energy industry back on, back on track here. Energy day up 2.7%. Financials up 2.1%. Consumer discretionary 1.9% Again all the troops you want to see were higher today. Utilities they have the downside led to the way lower with losses of 1.1%.

Again Commodity Watch, very, very strong here. Last year was not a fluke folks. Gold today up another $130 an ounce up 3% at 44, 16 ounce. Silver up a big 7.7%. 76.50. Again if you’re listening to people telling you that the the highs are in for a gold and silver in the miners, I would recommend you listen to somebody else. This group is just getting started. This is a multi year move higher.

We’ve as we called it now for two years the bull market of bull markets in gold, silver and the miners, especially the miners, that’s where the leverage is. But again very strong day today. Skin silver ups almost 8% today. Copper up 5.2%. 5.99 a pound another all time high. Crude oil today again recovered, finishing up 1.7%. Just over a dollar a barrel at 2.58.34. And finally Bitcoin as I said a minute ago at the beginning of the podcast, really like bitcoin here.

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We like the crypto space here. Bitcoin up 3.2% today at 94,186 now up almost 8% over the last seven days. All right folks, that’s it for today. Hope you had a great day. You have an even better night again. Happy New Year to all you looking forward to crushing the markets with you in 2026.