Under the traditional formula for viewing currency movements, a rising currency is believed to be a huge impediment for economic expansion as exports “become relatively more expensive” against trading partners and competitors. This is a two-dimensional view in three-dimensional space as it leaves out the very necessities of finance. It isn’t just straightforward that one causes the other, as the [...]
The FOMC has been talking, so we hear, about changing “forward guidance” to indicate a potential rate hike sooner rather than later. They had already changed the basis of “forward guidance” back in September which largely negated what forward guidance actually meant. The concept is only pliable in the manner in which monetary theory has to follow “rational expectations.” Whenever [...]
The large selloff in UST on Friday has left many wondering what happened. While the jobs report was certainly a catalyst, it wasn’t really out of line with prior months. It’s not as if credit markets were suddenly awakened to the possibility that Yellen’s FOMC may do what it says, so I don’t think that the Establishment Survey provided any [...]
With liquidity running somewhat perilously noncommittal since June, you would think the riskiest parts of the credit market would be most affected. That is incorrect and once again stands out as to the bubbly nature of the current age. Aside from liquidity draining enthusiasm into and around October 15 and December 1, high yield debt has not only repriced itself [...]
I think the ongoing destruction in the Japanese Household sector demonstrates very well a specific shortcoming about economic statistics like GDP. The basic calculation of the particular measure that forms the headlines of almost all commentary is a comparison of the current quarter to the previous one. That right away opens the door to incongruities as there remain very definite [...]
I sincerely look forward to the day, which I believe wholeheartedly will come, when scant attention is paid to whatever monetary officials make for official statements about official positions. The times being what they are, however, demand inconsistency be answered. That is especially true wherever the FOMC has taken not just to being the “lender of last resort” as supposedly [...]
It was a bit of a shock in June 2014 when the repo market experienced sudden and sharp disorder. The surge in fails seemingly did not fit the conditions as convention held them in the middle of last year when everything was supposedly running so smoothly. In the eight months since then, repo fails have not much calmed, which has [...]
As per usual, the latest FOMC statement conjured up a storm of befuddlement about any number of topics. Most of the concerns, should they even be categorized thusly, amount to debated levels of disingenuousness surrounding oil prices (only a month ago there was nothing “bad” about a 60% collapse in the world’s primary resource input). However, there were a few [...]
On January 20, the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics released its full-year report on Chinese GDP. The introduction makes no mistake about what the Chinese government wishes to see out of the Chinese economy: In 2014, faced with the complicated and volatile international environment and the heavy tasks to maintain the domestic development, reform and stability, the Central Party Committee [...]
Looking through all the various indications of the “dollar” world, there is seemingly to this moment a great deal of calm. This is in sharp contrast to December where bearishness and tightening were not just evident but dangerously so (across almost every part of the global financial system). But those two observations are not necessarily expected in sequence, as typically [...]
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