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recovery

This Has To Be A Joke, Because If It’s Not…

By |2020-08-27T19:29:00-04:00August 27th, 2020|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

After thinking about it all day, I’m still not quite sure this isn’t a joke; a high-brow commitment of utterly brilliant performance art, the kind of Four-D masterpiece of hilarious deception that Andy Kaufman would’ve gone nuts over. I mean, it has to be, right?I’m talking, of course, about Jackson Hole and Jay Powell’s reportedly genius masterstroke. There’s a lot [...]

It Was Bad In The Other Sense, So Now What?

By |2020-08-17T18:28:33-04:00August 17th, 2020|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

According to the latest figures, Japan has tallied 56,074 total coronavirus cases since the outbreak began, leading to the death of an estimated 1,103 Japanese citizens. Out of a total population north of 125 million, it’s hugely incongruous. For now, however, it does present an obvious reason why the government there didn’t go to such deliberate lockdown extremes as so [...]

What Did Everyone Think Was Going To Happen?

By |2020-06-05T16:52:11-04:00June 5th, 2020|Markets|

Honestly, what did everyone think was going to happen? I know, I’ve seen the analyst estimates. They were talking like another six or seven perhaps eight million job losses on top of the twenty-plus already gone. Instead, the payroll report (Establishment Survey) blew everything away, coming in both at two and a half million but also sporting a plus sign.The [...]

ECB Doubles Its QE; Or, The More Central Banks Do The Worse You Know It Will Be

By |2020-06-04T19:10:13-04:00June 4th, 2020|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

A perpetual motion machine is impossible, but what about a perpetual inflation machine? This is supposed to be the printing press and central banks are, they like to say, putting it to good and heavy use. But never the inflation by which to confirm it.So round and round we go. The printing press necessary to bring about consumer price acceleration, [...]

Stagnation Never Looked So Good: A Peak Ahead

By |2020-03-19T18:48:23-04:00March 19th, 2020|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

Forward-looking data is starting to trickle in. Germany has been a main area of interest for us right from the beginning, and by beginning I mean Euro$ #4 rather than just COVID-19. What has happened to the German economy has ended up happening everywhere else, a true bellwether especially manufacturing and industry. The latest sentiment figures from ZEW as well [...]

With Rate Cuts Looming, A Necessary Bit of Perspective Before Going Into Them

By |2019-05-23T17:18:19-04:00May 23rd, 2019|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

It is sometimes amazing what happens when you add just a little perspective. In some cases, it doesn’t require much at all to do so. One little addendum can upend the entire message, leading you off into entirely different interpretations. The implications can be enormous. To see what I mean, let’s begin with the basics. Below is what the public [...]

They Changed Inflation, At Least

By |2018-07-31T16:17:19-04:00July 31st, 2018|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

With the switch to the 2012 reference, the new fixed dollar comparison makes revisions in the PCE Deflator a bit springier. Lows are a little lower; highs a little higher. At the bottom in 2009 (July), for example, the 2009 reference says consumer price inflation was -1.18%. This new 2012 reference says it was -1.24%. For June 2009, the difference [...]

The Last Boiling Frog Gave Birth To The Modern Unemployment Rate

By |2018-06-20T16:27:36-04:00June 20th, 2018|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The origins of the modern unemployment rate were, of course, political in nature. Before, the question was simple: you were either employed or you weren’t. There weren’t so many various stages of condition, a gradation that today is as enthusiastically applied to the very definition of the labor force itself. In August 1937, Congress finally authorized a national survey of [...]

It’s Not The Minutes, It’s The Months and Years

By |2018-05-23T16:14:50-04:00May 23rd, 2018|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

It’s the kind of thing you’re supposed to overlook and not think too deeply about. Recall the basis of inflation hysteria: the economy was poised to take off and do so convincingly; that plus the ubiquitous LABOR SHORTAGE!!! meant that wages then inflation were going to break out higher; accelerating consumer prices were then to force the FOMC into a [...]

Why The Last One Still Matters (IP Revisions)

By |2018-04-18T14:58:16-04:00April 18th, 2018|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

Beginning with its very first issue in May 1915, the Federal Reserve’s Bulletin was the place to find a growing body of statistics on US economic performance. Four years later, monthly data was being put together on the physical volumes of trade. From these, in 1922, the precursor to what we know today as Industrial Production was formed. The index [...]

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