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Thomas Piketty’s Brief History is the fourth installment of his assault on economic inequality, following as it does the best-selling Capital in the Twenty-First Century and Capital and Ideology. The third, Time for Socialism: Dispatches from a World on Fire, 2016–2021, is just a collection of popular articles based on which the New York Times dubbed Piketty a “vaguely left-of-center” economist. This slim fourth volume from Harvard University Press calls for...

Overview: Equities were mostly higher in the Asia Pacific region, though Chinese and Hong Kong markets eased, and South Korea and India were closed for national holidays. Despite new Chinese exercises off the coast of Taiwan following another US congressional visit, Taiwan’s Taiex gained almost 0.85%. Europe’s Stoxx 600 is advancing for the fourth consecutive session, while US futures are paring the pre-weekend rally. Following disappointing data and a surprise cut...

Interview original date: July 25th, 2022. Topics- GDP numbers, recession, people accepting we are entering a recession, the White House, markets worried about what's ahead of us after the recession, inflation, negative real GDP growth, downside risk in the economy, financial crisis, eurodollar curve inverted, GFC, eurodollar futures curve, the ranking system is very different now than it was in 2008, eurodollar system is still broken, it's impossible to predict how the recession will be...

With the Consumer Price Index (CPI) hitting a forty-year high of 9.1 percent, the Bank of England has responded by raising interest rates to 1.25 percent, up by 0.25 from the previous period. This, alongside ex-chancellor and PM hopeful Rishi Sunak planning to “tackle inflation before tax cuts,” signals a poor plan for combating the rising effects of inflation. First, inflation must be defined by its cause rather than its effect for the monetary authorities to enact...

If you all feel bad about the economy than the economy will be bad and you all are acting weird, so says a recent New York Times opinion column. We discuss whether concrete economic signals / data precede "vibes". Also, is the Federal Reserve the key "vibes" emitter? ****EP. 274 REFERENCES**** The Vibes in the Economy Are … Weird. Really Weird.: https://nyti.ms/3dzG2vi RealClear Markets Essays: https://bit.ly/38tL5a7 Epoch Times Columns: https://bit.ly/39ESkRf...

15.08.2022 – The Producer and Import Price Index fell in July 2022 by 0.1% compared with the previous month, reaching 109.7 points (December 2020 = 100). Lower prices were seen in particular for basic metals and semi-finished metal products. Compared with July 2021, the price level of the whole range of domestic and imported products rose by 6.3%. These are the results from the Federal Statistical Office (FSO). In particular, higher prices for metal products,...

Credit Suisse is trying to recoup hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of its wealthiest clients © Keystone / Michael Buholzer Credit Suisse Group applied to the English High Court last week to initiate formal legal proceedings against Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp over a $440 million (CHF414 million) dispute, according to the Financial Times. The claims are related to Credit Suisse’s Greensill-linked supply chain finance funds lent to SoftBank-backed Katerra, a...

War is a primitive human institution. From time immemorial, men were eager to fight, to kill, and to rob one another. However, the acknowledgment of this fact does not lead to the conclusion that war is an indispensable form of interpersonal relations and that the endeavors to abolish war are against nature and therefore doomed to failure. We may, for the sake of argument, admit the militarist thesis that man is endowed with an innate instinct to fight and to...

The bullish dollar narrative was fairly straightforward. Yes, the US main challengers, China and Russia, have been hobbled in different ways by self-inflicted injuries. Still, the driver of the dollar was the expected aggressive tightening by the Federal Reserve. The market accepted that after being a bit slower than ideal (though faster and before many other large central banks), the Fed would move forcefully against inflation, even if it diminished the chances of...

Lake Lei is located almost entirely on Italian territory. Only the dam is on Swiss soil. © Keystone / Gian Ehrenzeller A large alpine solar power plant is to be installed on the dam wall of Lake Lei near Ferrera in southeastern Switzerland. The 1,800 square-metre plant is being built by the Zurich Electricity Company. Located at an altitude of 1,930 metres, the plant will comprise more than 1,000 solar units with a total output of 350 kilowatts, equivalent to the...