Economics and Finance News

Spaniards Celebrate Curfew End With 'Freedom' Fiestas  As the clock struck midnight in Spain, thousands of people poured into the city streets in the early hours of Sunday, celebrating the official end of the local coronavirus curfew.  The 11 p.m. curfew was lifted in 13 of the country's 17 regions at midnight. Footage from the beaches of Barcelona to the streets of Madrid saw […]

The Butterfly Effect Re-Setting The Global Paradigm Authored by Alastair Crooke via The Strategic Culture Foundation, The shift of paradigm centred on the U.S. pivot away from West Asia naturally impacts on Iran’s JCPOA calculus... In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the idea that small things can have non-linear impacts on a complex system. The concept is imagined with […]

Antony Blinken Continues To Lecture The World on Values His Administration Aggressively Violates: Greenwald Authored by Glenn Greenwald via greenwald.substack.com, Continuing his world tour doling out righteous lectures to the world, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday proclaimed — in a sermon you have to hear to believe — that few things are more sacred in a […]

Ranking US Generations On Their Power And Influence Over Society We’re on the cusp of one of the most impactful generational shifts in history. As it stands, the Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964) are America’s most wealthy and influential generation. But, as Visual Capitalist's Carmen Ang details below, even the youngest Boomers are close to retirement, with millions leaving the […]

Record-Low Deportations Part Of Biden's Plan To "Dismantle ICE": Former ICE Chief Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times, The record-low number of deportations in the United States in April signals that the Biden administration is working toward abolishing immigration enforcement, the former acting chief of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) says. “It’s […]

Visualizing What $50k In Lumber Can Build Today Versus Last Year Skyrocketing lumber prices have more than tripled over the past 12 months and made the cost associated with building an average new single-family home significantly rise. The folks at Visual Capitalist dove deeper into the lumber price storm to find out how many new single-family homes $50k in lumber can build today […]

Critical Race Theory Training In Workplace Could Lead To Increased Bullying, Anxiety, Expert Says Authored by Janita Kan via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), HR expert and author Jim Stroud says the impact of critical race theory (CRT) in workplace training could be detrimental to employees because it could lead to increased bullying and anxiety in the workplace. A woman holds a […]

Uneven Recovery Leaves Working-Poor Communities In The Dust  The US economy is fragmented more than ever. Millions of Americans continue to suffer job loss and housing and food inequities. At the same time, 650 billionaires in the US saw their net worth increase by more than $1 trillion since the pandemic began. A Bloomberg analysis provides a deep dive into the unevenness of the […]

Biden Gives Beijing Reason To Dump More Treasuries By Ye Xie, Bloomberg reporter and Market Live commentator Three things we learned last week: 1. The U.S.-China relationship remains tense. For anyone who expects an improvement in the U.S.-China relationship, it’s been a disappointing early start to the Biden administration. President Biden has kept almost all of Trump’s […]

Lessons From Steve Cohen And Jerry Seinfeld By Nick Colas of DataTrek Research This week we’re considering the concept of “Mastery”. The word can mean either “a high level of skill” or “control over something/ someone”. Steve Cohen and Jerry Seinfeld both have mastery of their respective crafts, for example. As different as trading and comedy may be, their process of […]

Liz Cheney Faces Chopping Block As GOP Braces For Chaotic Week House Republicans will return to Washington DC this week to address a growing schism in the party between never-Trumpers led by Rep. Liz Cheney (WY), and Rep. Elise Stefanik (NY) who hopes to replace her as chair of the House Republican Conference - a move endorsed on Sunday by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy - […]

We have reached the point of absurdity in the crypto markets. There were people buying Dogecoin last week in anticipation of Elon Musk's appearance on Saturday Night Live, with the expectation, presumably, that he would say something bullish and they'd be able to ring the cash register. Easy, peasy, cha ching. Except, well, at last [...]

Canadian Preacher Artur Pawlowski Arrested, Charged After Allegedly Defying Public Health Orders Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times, Officials in Calgary, Canada, said they arrested Artur Pawlowski, a street preacher who allegedly defied local lockdowns, over the weekend. “Earlier today, police arrested two organizers of a church service who were in violation of […]

The Generals Will Be Back: Goldman Assures Its Clients That FAAMGs Will Make Triumphant Return Earlier today, Morgan Stanley's chief equity strategist Michael Wilson looked at what was likely the highlight of Q1 earnings season, pointing out that "the vaunted FAANMG stocks sold off on terrific 1Q earnings results after an outsized run into the event. This was... a reminder that […]

Derby Drug Bust: Thoroughbred On Roids Could See Victory Revoked Winner of the famed Kentucky Derby on May 1st, the thoroughbred Medina Spirit, could have its victory removed after failing a post-race drug test, it was revealed Sunday. The growing scandal included Churchhill Downs taking the dramatic action of immediately suspending Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert over suspicions […]

$170,000 Per Year: The Post-COVID Hiring Crunch Is Hitting The World Of AI Data Scientists We already know that minimum wage payers are having trouble recalling workers for their post-Covid plans. And why wouldn't they? Laid off workers have been making more on unemployment and PPP loans over the last year than they likely ever made working rank-and-file jobs in years past. But now […]

The state lost 182,000 people in 2020, but added 100,000 homes, for 270,000 people. Los Angeles lost 52,000 people, added 18,000 homes. San Francisco lost 14,800 people, added 4,000 homes.

The Mystery Of Dark Energy Authored by Alex Kimani via OilPrice.com, "Dark energy is not only terribly important for astronomy, it's the central problem for physics. It's been the bone in our throat for a long time." - Steven Weinberg, Nobel Laureate, University of Texas at Austin. More than three years into its quest to solve the nature of dark energy and illuminate the […]

US Declares State Of Emergency To Keep Gasoline Flowing After Colonial Fails To Restart Hacked Pipeline Update 9:00pm ET:  The US government declared a state of emergency late on Sunday, lifting limits on the transport of fuels by road in a bid to keep gas supply lines open as fears of shortages spiked after the continued shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline. “This Declaration […]

Rickards: The Sky Is Falling Authored by James Rickards via The Daily Reckoning, What do you think is America’s most serious geopolitical challenge - China, Russia, Iran, maybe North Korea? None of the above, apparently. According to President Biden’s Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, climate change needs to be “at the center” of countries’ national […]

Compressed Air Grid 'Battery' To Challenge Tesla Powerpack  Solar, wind, batteries, nuclear, tidal power, among others, provide carbon-free electricity. But their generation is usually immediately absorbed into the power grid for use or stored in lithium-ion batteries. Large-scale energy hoarding is expensive, and quite frankly, with base metal prices skyrocketing, maybe […]

Hedge Fund CIO: There Are Just Two Ways To Fix Today's Imbalances - An Economic Depression Or Soaring Inflation As excerpted from the latest letter by Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management Late and Awkward: “The March 2020 downturn resembled a natural disaster rather than a recession that cleansed imbalances,” said Marcel, our head of research, discussing economic […]

A Golden Future: Visualizing The Economic Case For The Barbarous Relic Throughout history, people have revered gold as a sign of wealth and a store of value. Today, gold is not only a precious metal but also a precious investment. In fact, as Visual Capitalist shows below, in 2020, 47% of global gold demand—the largest share—came from investors. Today’s infographic […]

The Inflation Monster Has Been Unleashed Authored by Bruce Wilds via Advancing Time blog, The monster known as inflation has been unleashed upon the world and will not easily retreat into the night. This is reflected in soaring commodity and housing prices. Due to the stupid and self-serving policies of the Fed, we are about to experience a massive shift in the way we live. Bubbling […]

Retail Participation In Stock Trading Has Collapsed A little over a month ago, at the end of March, we first pointed out something troubling for the bulls: after leading the market in terms of both sentiment and volume, retail participation had collapsed. This was most obvious when looking at OCC option data, where SpotGamma noted "a sense of decay or attrition happening on the call […]

DC Mayor Bans Dancing At Weddings... & Other Absurdities Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com, Are you ready for this week’s absurdity? Here’s our weekly roll-up of the most ridiculous stories from around the world that are threats to your liberty, risks to your prosperity… and on occasion, inspiring poetic justice. CIA goes full woke in new recruiting campaign […]

The Paycheck Protection Program Is Officially Out Of Money The Paycheck Protection Program has officially "run out of money", hopefully putting an end to what was likely one of the most abused and poorly watched over government cash troughs ever created. The program has run out of money before its planned May 31 end date, the Small Business Administration said, according to CNBC.  […]

The city’s building inspector confided, “I don’t know why anyone would ever pull a permit for an apartment remodel; the cities make it so difficult.”

And if it doesn't last after the stimmies are gone, dealers will sit on massively overpriced collateral, which could get messy.

Awash in “stimulus”, but none able to dent a semiconductor shortage which is purportedly the reason for production woes. In the US and many other places around the world, governments have gone nuclear, with America’s federal authorities dropping checks with abandon. This has created, according to some, everyone in the media, a red hot economy [...]

Money manager Eric Hickman is a number-cruncher who’s also a student of history. And looking at the past 100 years of market data, he’s forced to conclude that the stock market is due for a whopper of a correction — one that could happen at any moment…

DISCLAIMER: The opinions expressed within the content are solely the author’s and do not reflect the opinions and beliefs of the website or its affiliates. 70.0: Reading Around - George Friedman on War with China and Russia ———WHY——— Historian and geopolitical strategist George Friedman's commentary on the (un)likelihood of war with China and Russia. A [...]

Okay, so we are having a little bit of fun here… but this really is a massively bullish pattern for Gold. And we have been tracking this Gold cup with handle pattern since early 2020.

Now gold is in the ascending phase of the new cycle, which is when the best gains for gold prices are usually seen.

Here are the presentation slides to accompany our Crescat Gets Activist on Gold #30.

Precious metals markets will lift over time with the rising tide of inflation. Recent trends show inflation running hotter than it has in years.

Huge miss. Whopping dud. Maybe it wasn’t nearly that bad?The consensus forecast had called for payroll growth in April 2021 of something like +980,000, in line with the previous blowout estimate for March. In the updated batch, first that prior one was revised downward to just +770,000 and then the latest guess put the current [...]

Central banks and gold have a long history together. Gold was treated as money well before the creation of central banks, the modern-day stewards of monetary policy.

Just yesterday, we showed that only a few quarters after banks effectively shut down, refusing to give out C&I, credit card or auto loans and mortgages to virtually anyone as a result of record Draconian credit standards, credit standards saw a complete U-turn and as of April, lending standards for credit cards and autos were the loosest on record.

As a result, the national debt of $ 28.2 trillion will grow even faster. Worse yet, when unfunded liabilities are included on the balance sheet, as private companies are legally required to do, the debt exceeds $ 120 trillion.

The bizarre phenomenon of companies complaining about “labor shortages” amid dropping job applicants, while 9.8 million are “unemployed,” and 16.2 million people claim unemployment benefits.

There's not many of us in the transitory camp, but add economist David Rosenberg to the list.

In other words, if the trillions in debt-funded stimulus injected by Biden do in fact translate into a non-transitory boost to GDP growth, then all bets are off. Said otherwise, it will be extremely ironic if the Biden stimulus plan works... and the US economy implodes as yields soar.

As of today, almost 70 percent of what the federal government does involves simply taking money from one group of people and giving it to another. Less than one-third of the money Washington spends is spent in the name of actual governance.

Hedge funds and asset managers are scooping up derivatives that pay off when the dollar declines slowly or stays within a narrow range. In one strategy, known as a strangle, traders sell both bullish and bearish options for short periods.

"The low-income worker is a net beneficiary of bigger government for about 10 years. But as time goes on, the worker would be far better off with smaller government and faster growth. Different assumptions will lead to different results, of course. My goal is simply to help readers understand...

With Brainard, Jerome Powell, and Treasury secretary Janet Yellen focusing on the climate, the M1 money supply has gone parabolic, from just over $4 trillion in February to $18.6 trillion in March. This is right out of Gideon Gono’s playbook. The once governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, said, among many outrageous things, “There is a positive correlation between the drought and […]

Hedge funds have accumulated the biggest short position on junk bonds since 2008 in another sign that investors are lining up to bet against frothy debt markets.About $55 billion of global high-yield bonds has been sold short, according to data from IHS Markit Ltd. That’s up from $35 billion at the start of the year.The heady mix of rich valuations and willingness...

A large option bet on quicker rate-hikes by the Federal Reserve got bigger this week, even as officials pushed back against hawkish expectations.The wager -- carrying a notional value of $40 billion -- is focused on a possible surprise at the annual August symposium in Jackson Hole, which has been used in the past by central bankers to signal changes in monetary...

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Press Secretary Jen Psaki hold a briefing at the White House on Friday after a big miss on the April jobs report. Hiring was a huge letdown in April, with nonfarm payrolls increasing by a much less than expected 266,000 and the unemployment rate rose to 6.1% amid an escalating shortage of available workers.

About 29% of unemployed Americans have been out of work at least a year, a period of joblessness stretching to the early days of the Covid pandemic.

Executive Vice President and Chief Policy Officer Neil Bradley released the following as a statement, saying that while there might have been a time when the benefit was needed, that time has now passed. "Paying people not to work is dampening what should be a stronger jobs market" and is hurting the overall recovery, he said.

The system allows the Fed to enable the banks to make risky bets. When they win, they make billions; when they lose, the taxpayers are stuck with the losses.

The Fed’s total assets on its balance sheet for the week through Wednesday, May 5, fell by $10 billion from the prior week and by $40 billion from the record two weeks earlier, to $7.77 trillion. Over the 14 months since the crazy money-printing show has started, the Fed has piled $3.53 trillion in assets on top of its existing mountain.

According to Bloomberg, economists are suddenly 'baffled' by perhaps the most obvious outcome of a government paying people not to work during the pandemic; there's a giant shortage of people willing to return to the workforce.

Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari said he has “zero sympathy” for critics on Wall Street, who slam the central bank’s aggressive support of the U.S. economy while millions of Americans remain out of work.“For my friends on Wall Street, and I have a lot of them, I hear from them all the time complaining about the Fed’s policies...

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Friday tapped former Federal Reserve official Michael Hsu to be acting chief of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).

The 266,000 jobs that U.S. firms added in April give Federal Reserve policymakers little reason to do anything but keep the monetary policy tap wide open until it is clear the economy is on a path back to full employment.

Inflation expectations are at multiyear highs and investors should pay attention, says Lakshman Achuthan of the Economic Cycle Research Institute.

In a year of food supply-chain disruptions hitting from all angles, here are two more things for producers and consumers to worry about: recycled paper and corn, and how they affect packaging.

China held 62.64 million fine troy ounces of gold at the end of April, unchanged from a month earlier, the data showed. The value of its gold reserves rose to $110.73 billion at the end of April from $109.18 billion at the end of March.

The central bank’s financial stability report used the phrase “meme stocks” and highlighted voracious risk appetite in IPOs and SPACs.

Wall Street’s new overseer confirmed he won’t back down from tough battles with the financial industry as he laid out an agenda for increased regulation in numerous contentious areas.Gary Gentler, making his first appearance before Congress after being sworn in as Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, pledged Thursday to confront...

For once the disappointing ADP report was right. With expectations of today's payroll print soaring, consensus expecting a whopping 1 million number and some forecasters calling as high as 2+ million, few were prepared for a miss. And of course the market gods made sure to inflict the most possible pain with the BLS reporting an April payroll of just 266K in April, a huge miss compared to the 1 […]

After Mega Banks Supervised by the Fed Lose Over $10 Billion to a Highly Leveraged Hedge Fund, Fed Puts Lipstick on a Pig in its Financial Stability Report By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 7, 2021 ~ Remember the phrase “putting lipstick on a pig.” It became popular after the dot.com bust when it was learned that the big Wall Street banks had glowingly recommended “hot” new issues of […]

Precious metals: Having failed on a handful occasions during the past couple of weeks, gold finally managed to mount an attack strong enough to take it above $1800. While lower U.S. real yields and a softer dollar provided the fundamental tailwind the yellow metal needed support from in-demand silver, one of the best performing commodities this week. During the past month, the continued rally […]

Spot gold was up 0.3% at $1,819 per ounce after hitting its highest since Feb. 16 earlier in the session.

DoubleLine's Jeffrey Gundlach called the Fed's bluff late last month, telling investors during an interview that he suspected the central bank was merely "guessing" about the impact of inflation being "transitory".

Now that Democrats are in power, and Elizabeth Warren's "wealth tax" is now firmly on the table, it looks like Dimon - who is, according to Forbes, a billionaire - has changed his tune. Back in September, before the election, Dimon modified his stance, arguing that while higher taxes on high earners would be appropriate, a "wealth tax " like Warren's would do more harm than good.

The pandemic brought the American steel industry to its knees last spring, forcing manufacturers to shut down production as they struggled to survive the imploding economy. But as the recovery got underway, mills were slow to resume production, and that created a massive steel shortage.

The US Federal Reserve has warned that existing measures of hedge fund leverage “may not be capturing important risks”, pointing to the collapse of Archegos Capital as an example of hidden vulnerabilities in the global financial system.

Rising asset prices in the stock market and elsewhere are posing increasing threats to the financial system, the Fed warned in a report Thursday.

The second largest euro area economy predicts that its public debt ratio is likely to stand at 117.8% in 2021, and to fall only slightly to 116.3% in 2022.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note advanced to 1.575% at 7 a.m. ET. The yield on the 30-year Treasury bond rose to 2.247%. Yields move inversely to prices.

The severity of the global chip shortage has gone up a notch over the last few weeks and it's now looking as though millions of people will be impacted. 

When asked about the rising value of cryptocurrencies, Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said: "They have no intrinsic value."

The ratings and analysis firm said that the large number of Italian banks, the relative size of the market taken by the top banks, and the need for digitalization increase the pressure on smaller lenders to consolidate with others.

The latest news and updates on the coronavirus outbreak from CNBC’s global teams in Asia, Europe and the U.S.

QE from crisis to crisis, and even when there is no crisis.

Reopening 2 is definitely happening. The labor market, in particular, is sending off the same kind of signals if not to the same huge extent as it had during Reopening 1 in May and June of last year. The March 2021 payroll report was better than 900,000, and the one for April (last month) to [...]

If we consider that silver was priced at $4.20 in late 2001, a 37x return would take it to about $155. However, I think this bull market could be an order of magnitude larger for a number of reasons, the main ones being debt, credit and money printing. As a result, I think silver's ultimate peak could be $300, and I won't rule out possibly even higher.

Gold jumped over 1% on Thursday with a weaker dollar and easing Treasury yields propelling it over the key $1,800 psychological level.

Silver-backed Exchange Traded Products (ETPs), increased almost threefold to 331 million ounces (Moz), surpassing 1 billion ounces of silver in 2020. Additionally, global physical silver investment (silver coin and bar purchases), grew 8 percent to 200.5 Moz, according to the World Silver Survey 2021, which was researched and produced by Metals Focus, the precious metals consultancy on behalf of […]

A growing number of Americans understand that the reckless creation of fiat currency by the Federal Reserve System is causing many of our economic problems. They want to abolish the Fed and return to the gold-backed currency that brought America and the world unprecedented prosperity throughout the 19th century.

First we saw comments from the Biden administration that it would likely follow former President Trump’s China investment ban policy. Then, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler told the House Financial Services committee that congress should consider regulating crypto exchanges.

The whopping $6 trillion price tag on Biden's proposals from his first 100 days has raised many eyebrows about how a nation more than $28 trillion in debt can afford such a splurge. But one prominent Johns Hopkins economist is warning that the true cost of Biden’s plans could be more than three times higher than advertised. Here's why.

Silver is spiking and billionaires are buying gold for the first time. Have we already seen Mike Maloney’s scenario of ‘short term deflation’ play out? Join our team in today’s must-watch video for the answer.

The Big Taper starts one central bank at a time. But you gotta keep the markets from swooning with a bit of welcome delusion.

It's been a long time since inflation posed a potential problem for investors, and some strategists have some ideas how to defend a portfolio against it.

There is a risk of "Literal Printing", but QE is not that risk.

The CDC, citing public health grounds, had implemented the temporary halt on evictions, extending protections for millions of tenants who have fallen behind on their rent during the pandemic. But a series of conflicting lower court rulings has called into question the legality of the moratorium, creating uncertainty for landlords and tenants alike.

Biden is weighing whether to forgive up to $50,000 in federal student debt amid pressure from Elizabeth Warren and Chuck Schumer.

The Biden administration's plan to count on $700 billion over the next decade from enhanced IRS audits of the wealthy and corporations - a major source of funding for his economic agenda - is wishful thinking, and will probably take years to bear fruit at all, according to Bloomberg.

Anyone who believes the “rich” and large corporations will pay for $28 trillion in debt or the $2 trillion in new deficit has a real problem with math. Biden’s announcement of a massive tax increase on businesses and wealthier segments of the population simply makes no sense.

That is based on an assessment of the so-called breakeven inflation rate — or the difference between nominal and real Treasury yields — which has been rising steadily since collapsing at the start of the pandemic, the economists said in BofA Global Research report Wednesday.

The Brazilian real advanced after the central bank lifted its benchmark rate by 75 basis points and promised another hike of the same size next month in a renewed push to bring inflation back to target...

Other companies are raising wages to attract employees, which could inflate prices for customers or reduce profit margins for owners.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has called the risks emanating from “frothy” stock prices and other potential financial imbalances “manageable.” Some current and former central bankers are not so sure. They worry that the Fed’s rock-bottom interest rates and massive bond buying might lead to asset price bubbles,...

The share of US dollar reserves held by central banks fell to 59 percent—its lowest level in 25 years—during the fourth quarter of 2020, according to the IMF’s Currency Composition of Official Foreign Exchange Reserves...

In response to Kaplan's hawkish comments stocks, which were already weak in early trading, slumped to session lows, forcing the Fed to engage in damage control again as today's remaining speakers offset Kaplan's remarks, while Yellen White House appearance tomorrow will likely be dedicated entirely to easing frayed investor nerves.

On inflation, the BOE said it expects the consumer prices index to temporarily climb above its 2% target toward the end of this year.

World food prices increased for a 11th consecutive month in April, hitting their highest level since May 2014, with sugar leading a rise in all the mainindices, the United Nations food agency said on Thursday.

The fiscal transformation has set the stage for a long period of economic decline and zero-sum, polarized politics.

There is a growing recognition in financial circles that price inflation will increase significantly in the near future, and official estimates that it will be a temporary phenomenon limited to an average of 2% are overly optimistic. There is, therefore, increasing speculation about the need for interest rates to rise.The bond yield on 10-year US Treasuries has already more than doubled over the […]

69.0: LIVE! Reaction - Answering The Economist———Ep 69 Intro———The Economist magazine states that "the covid-19 crisis is highlighting the limits of unemployment-insurance figures" and therefore "jobless-claims data give little insight into America’s economy". Jeff Snider reacts Live! to the article and offers his own thoughts. ———See It———– […]

Gensler May Force Banks to Disclose Actual Owners of Stocks Under Archegos-Styled, Tricked-Up Derivative Contracts By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 6, 2021 ~ The House Financial Services Committee will hold its third hearing today at noon on the GameStop and other meme stock trading fiascos of January. It will be the first time that the newly sworn in Chair of the SEC, Gary Gensler, gives […]

And while continuing claims ticked up very modestly last week (at 3.69mm from 3.65mm), the number of Americans on some form of government jobless benefit remains above 16 million...

Gold prices traded higher Thursday morning, pushing the commodity near a psychologically significant value around $1,800 as slipping bond yields and a slightly weaker U.S. dollar offered some support.

By signing sound money legislation today, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson has officially ended sales taxation on gold, silver, platinum, and palladium bullion and coins– thereby setting an example for legislators in New Jersey, Maine, Ohio, and Tennessee, who are still considering similar measures in their own states this year.

U.S. inflation is unlikely to get out of control despite the unprecedented government spending that’s been authorized in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Federal Reserve officials said.“Our baseline view is that inflation is going to be close to our long-run objective of 2%, but we will be vigilant,” Fed Vice Chair Richard Clarita...

As seemingly every policy maker and market prognosticator jumps into the inflation fray, those who are putting their money where their mouths are have pushed one gauge of expected price pressures to an almost 13-year high. The five-year breakeven rate, a proxy for the annual inflation rate bond traders expect over the span, breached 2.7%...

Rents are soaring in many U.S. cities as the economy rebounds, squeezing the budgets of tenants who also face increased risk of eviction after courts overturned a pandemic-era ban.

Fed Vice Chairman Richard Clarida said he thinks the central bank should keep policy in place even as the economy storms back.

The world risks "running out of copper" amid widening supply and demand deficits, according to Bank of America, and prices could hit $20,000 per metric ton by 2025.

The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield moved slightly lower on Thursday morning, ahead of the release of weekly jobless claims data.

Gensler also left the door open to enforcement actions against those violating SEC rules: “While I cannot comment on ongoing examination and enforcement matters, SEC staff is vigorously reviewing these events for any violations. I also have directed staff to consider whether expanded enforcement mechanisms are necessary.”

But Biden’s plan to raise taxes to fund blue-collar jobs and family benefits is pushing Republicans back into the position of defending corporate tax cuts and opposing popular policies.

The latest news and updates on the coronavirus outbreak from CNBC’s global teams in Asia, Europe and the U.S.

“The future of work is flexibility,” CEO Pichai told employees today.

Maybe it’s just me, but if you’re going to scream about everyone screaming about inflation it’s probably not a good idea to use Janet Yellen’s face as this idea’s avatar. Even if most in the public likely don’t know why, this can’t help your credibility with the rest who absolutely do. And by “the rest”, [...]

68.3 US Treasury Auction Brings Surprisingly Bad News ———Part 3 Summary———On April 23 the 5-year US Treasury Inflation Protected Security auction resulted in LOWER inflation expectations. For years now these auctions conveyed RISING market-based inflation expectations. But now? With monetary 'printing' and fiscal 'stimulus' gone wild the market says, "Put your shirt back on." […]

Deconstructing long-term interests may seem like a purely academic exercise. This is certainly how Economists treat it, coming at them using their statistical models. The goal is always to properly interpret these most basic of economic, financial, and monetary fundamentals so as to understand where everything that matters stands. Getting this wrong is the difference [...]

“A pullback in the dollar more broadly, after last night’s strong selling has been supportive for gold prices,” IG Market analyst Kyle Rodda said.

Events that devastate the majority financially greatly enrich the few who bet on non-linear dynamics.

Yesterday I pointed out how inflation has become deeply embedded in our financial system. As a quick recap, inflation arrives in stages. It’s not as though it appears overnight and suddenly the cost of everything rises. Instead, inflation slowly works … Continue reading →

You don’t need a PhD in economics to smell the BS. Inflation is not some potential issue down the road. Inflation is already here. As Warren Buffett told investors only days ago, “We’re seeing very substantial inflation.”

As a result of the recent stimulus policies employed by the US government and the Fed, most commentators are of the view that the risk of a deepening slump in the US economy on account of the covid-19 pandemic has now receded.

U.S. lumber futures rallied as much as 4% to $1,541 per 1,000 board feet Wednesday, the highest ever for a most-active contract. The surge came as voracious home-construction and renovation demand sends builders scrambling to secure the wood they need.

What a circus. I imagine there’s a big sign in every Fed building in America: Don’t drop, fragile, handle with care. Janet Yellen, while no longer in a Fed building, committed the cardi…

“My view is that this acceleration in the rate of price increases is likely to prove temporary,” Rosengren said Wednesday in a webinar with Boston College.

Irrational behavior by buyers confidently betting on being able to pass on that irrationality to their customers. It works until it doesn’t.

Let's conduct a QE "what if" thought experiment with the parameters I specify below.

Fed Chair Powell showed how simple questions do not always get simple answers. When speaking to the media after the latest Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, some difficult questions were asked. So much so, Powell had to repeat one question to himself, asking: When will the economy be able to stand on its own feet? He immediately followed with: I'm not sure what the exact nature of […]

The Buffett Yardstick, or total market capitalization of the U.S. equity market relative to the overall size of the economy, now stands at a gaudy 270%. For reference, at the peak of the Dotcom Mania, this measure only reached 188% so we are now over 40% more expensive than the most expensive stock...

The Paycheck Protection Program will only accept new applications from Community Financial Institutions, as funding for other borrowers has run out.

The National Restaurant Association projects that from March of 2020 through April of this year 110,000 restaurants have closed either permanently or long-term.

A federal judge struck down on Wednesday the national eviction moratorium, potentially leaving millions of Americans at risk of losing their homes.

"The immediate lesson from all of this is that Biden’s plan is a boondoggle waiting to happen (just as would have been the case with Trump). The longer-term lesson is that we should get the federal government out of the business of infrastructure."

The Treasury Department says it will employ measures to avoid an unprecedented default on the national debt this summer, but officials say those measures could be exhausted “much more quickly” than normal given the unusual circumstances of the global pandemic...

Maybe drawings can deter elected officials from their outrageous spending habits where detailed reports have failed to attract their attention.

“The IMF has been calling for a minimum global corporate income tax rate as a way to interrupt the race to the bottom in corporate income taxation,” IMF Fiscal Affairs Director Vitor Gaspar said in April.

What's left are the 'fatal synergies' of soaring debt and leverage, diminishing returns on stimulus, the substitution of credit for savings and the coming deflationary tsunami that pops all the speculative bubbles.

Economist Judy Shelton points out that during the entire term of Chairman Jerome Powell & his predecessor, Janet Yellen, not a single dissenting vote was recorded among the governors. It reminds us of the central bank of the Soviet Union.

Investors are woefully unprepared for what may be a once-in-a generation shift in the market.

The biggest uncertainty for investors watching the Federal Reserve in coming months may not be the rate of inflation but turnover at the top of the U.S. central bank.Chair Jerome Powell and vice chairs Richard Clarita and Randal Quarrels could all potentially be replaced...

Shhh! Don’t Tell Congress that the Cabal It’s Investigating Over GameStop and Archegos Quietly Got SEC Approval to Jointly Run their Own Stock Exchange By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: May 5, 2021 ~ The House Financial Services Committee has released its official Memorandum outlining the general topics it wants to cover in tomorrow’s hearing on the wild trading action in GameStop and other […]

This sort of sudden structural collapse in demand for office space raises some existential questions for landlords.

As Ben Bernanke has another one of his myths begin the process of falling apart, his successor Janet Yellen chimes in today with yet another reminder why that must be. Though Yellen now sits in an even bigger chair, so to speak, having failed upward to Treasury, this one’s the sort of thing upon which [...]

The promise of high-value services exports to rationalize globalization turned out to be fake.

As well as financing escalating government deficits, central banks face an additional problem of replacing contracting bank credit to the non-financial private sector if a slump is to be avoided. The problem comes at the worst possible time in the bank credit cycle, with commercial banks’ balance sheets as highly leveraged as they have ever been.Banks are already reducing their credit […]

The oil price crash on the back of the COVID-19 lockdowns has accelerated the coming supply crunch. Both national and international oil companies have slashed CAPEX and maintenance spending, which will accelerate decline rates and US shale drillers finally focus on profitability instead of growth. Current longer-dated oil prices are too low to give enough incentive to oil companies to invest in […]

This article explains why attempting to achieve economic outcomes by managing interest rates fails. The basis of monetary interventionist theories ignores the discoveries of earlier free-market thinkers, particularly Say, Turgot and Böhm-Bawerk.It also ignores Gibson’s paradox, which demolishes the theory that managing interest rates controls price inflation. And incredulously, the whole basis […]

The oil price crash on the back of the COVID-19 lockdowns has accelerated the coming supply crunch. Both national and international oil companies have slashed CAPEX and maintenance spending, which will push up decline rates and US shale drillers finally focus on profitability instead of growth. Current longer-dated oil prices are too low to give enough incentive to oil companies to invest in […]

A reminder why they always will be sound money and why bitcoin cannot fill that roleWith bitcoin’s price still rising and expected to rise even more, there has been a growing belief in cryptocurrency circles that it will replace unbacked government currencies when they eventually fail. The assumptions behind this conclusion are naïve, exposing hardly any knowledge in what qualities are needed […]

It has been recently estimated that global debts stand at $284 trillion equivalent, representing 355% of global GDP. Estimates such as these must be treated with caution, and they probably underestimate financial sector debt. Furthermore, no allowance in these figures is made for OTC derivatives, which according to the Bank for International Settlements have a gross value of $15.48 […]

This article explains the fundamental mistake behind Keynes’s General Theory, the vade mecum for all macro and mathematical economists today. It is no exaggeration to say that his casual rejection of Jean-Baptiste Say’s economic theories in his off-hand interpretation of them, that demand creates its own supply, is at the root of thew global economic and monetary crisis today.There never […]

In a continuing cold war, America is already on the back foot. We have yet to see how long it will be before the Biden administration realises its few victories will be unaffordably Pyrrhic, and by merely not responding to American provocation the Chinese/Russian partnership will emerge as the victors.Halford Mackinder’s century-old vision of a Eurasian superstate, based between the Volga and […]

Equity markets have relentlessly rallied over the past 12 months, pushing valuations to extreme levels based on traditional metrics. In this report, we analyze the two common arguments by equity bulls why this time is different and current valuations are justified. We find that markets are either currently mispricing gold or equities, as either of these arguments would imply that gold should […]