So if you think your life is complete confusionBecause you never win the gameJust remember that it's a grand illusionAnd deep inside we're all the sameWe're all the same So if you think your life is complete confusionBecause your neighbors got it madeJust remember that it's a grand illusionAnd deep inside we're all the same Styx, The Grand Illusion Money [...]
Inflation* in the US is falling rapidly with the CPI rising just 0.9% in the second half of 2022 versus 5.4% in the first six months. Existing home sales are down 14.6% in the last 3 months and 34% over the last year. Housing starts are down 22% and permits are down 30% year-over-year. Orders for durable goods are down [...]
When we think about the challenges facing an investor today, the big problems, the things we worry about that could cause a lot more harm than some interest rate hikes, are mostly outside the United States. China is prominent this weekend because of demonstrations against their zero-COVID policies. The Chinese people appear to be pretty well fed up with the [...]
Crude oil prices rose over 25% last week and as I sit down to write this evening, the overnight futures are up another 8% to around $125. Almost every other commodity on the planet rose in prices last week too, as did the dollar. Those two factors - rising dollar and rising commodity prices - mean the likelihood of recession [...]
Back in early June 2018, the Brazilian real was in free-fall (again). Never bothering to explain why or what was happening, the country’s top central banker just gathered the media together in front of him confident in how what he’d say to its members would be reported as fact. As it was. Not just by Brazil’s press, either. Even if [...]
The way you hear it nowadays, the dollar just can’t catch a break. If it’s not a load of “V’s” indicated by some obscure data point (like the otherworldly spike in US home ownership levels), then it is Jay Powell who is clearly gunning for the US currency. He can’t kill it fast enough, having had more than enough of [...]
One small silver lining to the current situation, while Jay Powell is busily trying to sell you his inflation fantasy, he’s actually undermining it at the very same time. No mere challenge to his own “money printing” fiction, either, the Fed’s Chairman is actively disproving the entire enterprise. While he says what he says, pay close attention instead to what [...]
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