The lull in US consumer spending on goods has reached a fifth month. The annual comparisons aren’t good, yet they somewhat mask the more recent problems appearing in the figures. According to the Census Bureau, total retail sales in January rose 4.58% year-over-year (unadjusted). Not a good number, but better, seemingly, than early on in 2019 when the series was [...]
As you might imagine, inflation was the hot topic of conversation during the December 2014 FOMC meeting. Having opened up the transcripts for that year to the public last month, we are once more treated to the background behind this theater of the absurd. The final few months of 2014 were when everything came together. For these central bankers, it [...]
Everyone who lived through the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) remembers the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, if not the name itself. The law had authorized TARP (among other things). It was passed during the messiest part of the panic, being signed into law on October 3, 2008. You can always tell what is not going to happen by whatever [...]
We knew German Industrial Production for December 2019 was going to be ugly given what deStatis had reported for factory orders yesterday. In all likelihood, Germany’s industrial economy ended last year sinking and maybe too quickly. What was actually reported, however, exceeded every pessimistic guess and expectation – by a lot. IP absolutely plummeted in the final month of 2019. [...]
On January 14, FRBNY announced that it would continue offering its short-term liquidity operations for another month, until at least February 13. In setting the scene in order to slowly wean primary dealers from its non-repo repo program, the New York branch also declared that at its term repo window the cap would be reduced from $35 billion to $30 [...]
Rolling over in credit stats, particularly business debt, is never a good thing for an economy. As noted yesterday, in Europe it’s not definite yet but sure is pronounced. The pattern is pretty clear even if we don’t ultimately know how it will play out from here. The process of reversing is at least already happening and so we are [...]
The Federal Reserve added the word “symmetric” to its inflation goal for a reason. Back in May 2018 when it was made official officials made quite a big deal out of it. It was for two reasons, actually, both of them intertwined in the way Economists believe the economic system is supposed to work; and the central bank’s place in [...]
Jay Powell says that three’s not a crowd, at least not for his rate cuts, but four would be. As usual, central bankers like him always hedge and say that “should conditions warrant” the FOMC will be more than happy to indulge (the NYSE). But what he means in his heart of hearts is that there probably won’t be any [...]
There he was, the Fed Chairman stumbling through a question about headwinds and transitory factors. No, not Jay Powell in January 2020, this was Ben Bernanke in June 2011. The Fed had just downgraded its recovery forecasts (again) and some in the media weren’t getting it. After all, QE2. It was this enormously powerful monetary agent introduced for a second [...]
It’s a palpable impatience. Having learned absolutely nothing from the most recent German example, there’s this pervasive belief that if the economy hasn’t fallen apart by now it must be going the other way. The right way. Those are the only two options for mainstream analysis (which means it isn’t analysis). You can see it in how everything is framed. [...]
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