What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet. - Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene II The Supreme Court finally released its ruling on President Trump's use of the IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977) to impose universal tariffs on foreign goods and the verdict was utterly [...]
As we near the end of the first year of President Trump's second presidential term, the debate about his economic policies hasn't changed much. That's because it isn't an economic debate mostly, but a political one and that applies to the public as well as economists (yes, they are as vulnerable to political bias as anyone else). Democrats hate Trump's [...]
President Trump announced last week that certain food products and some other goods will now be exempt from his "reciprocal"* tariffs. Some of these goods are things that we can't produce here in the US, like bananas and coffee, but others are products that, for various reasons, happen to be in short supply, like beef. President Trump said these actions [...]
Our view of the economy is somewhat obscured by the lack of official data but what information we do have from the last month points to an economy that continues to weaken - continuing a trend that has prevailed all year. The most obvious negative pronouncement about the economy came from voters last week, who produced some big surprises in [...]
You knew something had to shatter the calm. The market had become too complacent, making money was too easy lately. It has been 27 trading weeks since the last big tariff announcement - Trump's "liberation day" when he announced reciprocal tariffs on the entire world last April - and in 17 of those weeks, the S&P 500 traded higher, a [...]
There has been a lot of change in economic - and other - policies this year but not much change in the economic outlook. We've had a large tax hike in the form of import taxes (tariffs), a comprehensive tax and spending bill, a DOGE attack on various government departments, more government employee layoffs than has ever happened in one [...]
The Federal Reserve cut their target for the federal funds rate by 25 basis points last week due to concerns about labor market weakness. Job creation has certainly been weak the last 3 or 4 months but that is largely due to the uncertainty created by the Trump administration's haphazard implementation of their economic program. Well, not entirely. It is [...]
The Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee met last week with both Lisa Cook and Stephen Miran voting (more on that later). The committee lowered the target for the federal funds rate by 25 basis points and hinted at future cuts: Recent indicators suggest that growth of economic activity moderated in the first half of the year. Job gains have slowed, [...]
With the dollar index and interest rates in downtrends, it seems the US economy is slowing absolutely and relative to the rest of the world. The slowdown, so far, doesn't look that severe and we are likely to get a rate cut from the Fed this week. Last September, the Fed surprised the market with a 50 basis point cut [...]
I've said many times that no one should pay much attention to the monthly payroll figures because they are barely more than wild guesses, something the current administration's economic team only recently discovered. Last week's report for August, by itself, doesn't mean much and will be revised so I wouldn't put much emphasis on it. What investors should pay attention [...]
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