On March 2, the Bank of Japan leapt into the stock market, Haruhiko Kuroda burnishing his Superman cape as he flew in to rescue the Nikkei. Purchasing a record amount of ETF’s that day, shares in Tokyo surged. It was a clear message, or so everyone thought. Don’t fight the Fed nor the Bank of Japan, not when they can [...]
Can we please dispense with all notions that monetary policy works? Specifically balance sheet expansion via any scale asset purchase programs. Nowhere has that been more apparent than Japan. Go back and reread all the promised benefits from BoJ’s Big Bang QQE that were confidently written in 2013. The biggest bazooka ever conceived has fallen short in every conceivable way. [...]
I normally don’t pay much attention to mutual fund flows as they don’t have nearly the explanatory power or relevance in what is surely a more complicated and topographically inconsistent “market.” Equity mutual funds are no longer the primary measurement tool of “small” investor demand. That does not mean, however, that unusual events cannot contain something more than passing interest [...]
We have finally seen positive forward rates in the gold markets, though it is too early to make any firm interpretations about the direction of gold prices. We can note that on August 27, forward rates began moving in the positive direction while gold prices hit their most recent high on August 28. It is suggestive of a short-term drop [...]
Stay In Touch