repo market

Collateral Shortage > Bond Vigilantism (and it’s not even close)

By |2020-03-23T19:22:36-04:00March 23rd, 2020|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

Faced with severe economic distress and a global market meltdown, they promised that it would be big. Massive fiscal “stimulus”, however, might come at a price. In the short run it was necessary, according to the orthodox view. When a crisis shows up you don’t worry about how to pay for things. Once all is said and done, the current [...]

Rate Cuts, Repo, and (No) Money Printing

By |2019-11-20T16:02:35-05:00November 20th, 2019|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

I don’t think that was quite the message the FOMC wanted to send. It’s pretty clear what the Committee wanted to say, or wanted everyone to hear. The members are done with rate cuts because everything looks great. Sure, it all looked great to them last year but, as has become the conventional interpretation of late, hey, at least it [...]

Small Tremors

By |2018-02-06T12:22:41-05:00February 6th, 2018|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets, Stocks|

The current state of geological science cannot predict an earthquake. There is hope, however, that warnings might be realistically developed so that populations in danger of the “big one” can be given some sort of reasonable information about probabilities. In studying the past few devastating quakes, such as the 2011 9.0 that hit Japan twice (once in the shaking, then [...]

The Breadth of Shortage

By |2016-03-18T17:12:53-04:00March 18th, 2016|Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

The yield on the Japanese government’s 10-year paper traded negative yesterday for the 17th straight session. When Haruhiko Kuroda first announced his negative rate experimentation, the 10-year JGB was low but still safely positive, yielding 22.9 bps on January 28. It would be negative for the first time on February 9 right as the rest of the world started to [...]

Taper: Too Little, Too Late?

By |2014-06-17T15:21:34-04:00June 17th, 2014|Bonds, Currencies, Economy, Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

For my mind there are two actual explanations for tapering QE, neither of which follows the mainstream idea that the economy has gained sufficient “footing.” That provides the cover by which QE’s taper can be sold while preserving “credibility”, but it does not line up with anything else outside of the straightest line in the Establishment Survey. Instead, tapering is [...]

Cry Yen and Let Slip the Dogs of Negative Convexity

By |2013-05-23T13:44:51-04:00May 23rd, 2013|Federal Reserve/Monetary Policy, Markets|

Despite repeated assurances that the Bank of Japan would do whatever monetarisms it could to calm the Japanese bond markets, the persistent stain of selling pressure has not abated, rather it has increased. While to this point it had been relatively benign in the most obvious correlations, the Nikkei has risen steadily throughout, for example, there have been signs of [...]

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