The enormous setback hadn’t yet been fully appreciated in March 2012 when China’s Premiere Wen Jiabao spoke to and on behalf of the country’s Communist governing State Council. Despite it having been four years since Bear Stearns had grabbed the whole world’s attention (for reasons the whole world wouldn’t fully comprehend, specifically as to why the whole world would need [...]
For Janet Yellen, during her somewhat brief single term she never made the same kind of effort as Ben Bernanke had. Her immediate predecessor, Bernanke, wanted to make the Federal Reserve into what he saw as the 21st century central bank icon. Monetary policy wouldn’t operate on the basis of secrecy and ambiguity. Transparency became far more than a buzzword. [...]
It was like a scene out of the seventies. Americans lined in their cars all over the Southeast hoping that their local filling station would have gasoline. There were documented reports of shortages as far away as the Dakotas. This wasn’t typical behavior, fortunately, so it couldn’t have been too much like the oil embargo era. Instead, in early September [...]
It’s always a fine line for authorities. There are times when avoiding intervention is more effective than intervention. That’s particularly true when the efficacy of whatever proposed policy is in doubt. If you don’t know for sure that it will work, maybe don’t do it. There are often grave risks associated with plunging forward recklessly. In other words, officials can [...]
The 21st century central banker is a unicorn chaser. This has happened by default, a product of too little success despite ever-increasing interventions. In fact, the bigger these policy intrusions become the more likely it is the central bankers will attempt to turn something small into something big. It doesn’t matter that economies are noisy by nature. The best example [...]
Language is often said to be a living thing. Common everyday usage can and does introduce new words and changes the meaning of existing ones. But this is a gradual evolution, and rarely does the process leap ahead into more drastic alterations. Central bankers, however, are challenging such preconceptions. They write words that often have specific meanings in everyday custom [...]
The Steering Committee for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned last week that tighter financial conditions globally are a risk. A bit late perhaps, but that’s how these things go. You can tell matters are serious when Economists are shaken out from their global growth slumber. The IMF wants everyone to know that this could be a danger to not [...]
It was for a time a somewhat curious dilemma. When it rains it pours, they always say, and for China toward the end of 2015 it was a real cloudburst. The Chinese economy was slowing, dangerous deflation developing around an economy captured by an unseen anchor intent on causing havoc and destruction. At the same time, consumer prices were jumping [...]
What do consumers know that Economists don’t? It’s a loaded question, of course, particularly in this day and age where Economists spend years perfecting the study of mathematics. In many ways, formal training is an impediment to analysis of the economy. There’s nothing wrong with learning about regressions, but it can and often does appear to take away from intuitive [...]
Just like Jay Powell is surely hoping for some help from Mother Nature, the central bankers at the BoJ have to be wishing for more on their side of the Pacific. The US Federal Reserve will be looking for a repeat of last year’s Harvey and Irma effects out of Florence. It looks like they’ll need them. Japanese officials have [...]
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