SNB & CHF

Investors like to short bonds, even Treasuries, as much as they might stocks and their ilk. It should be no surprise that profit-maximizing speculators will seek the best risk-adjusted returns wherever and whenever they might perceive them. If one, or a whole bunch, has to first “borrow” a security the one doesn’t own in order to sell something at a high price betting the price to go down, you can likewise bet there’s someone out there in the financial landscape more...

On the fourteenth of October 2020, Antal E. Fekete, the Hungarian-Canadian economist who saw himself as a monetary theorist following the tradition of Carl Menger, died in Budapest. Behind him was an eventful and fruitful life which was quite typical of the crazy last century. His experiences eventually filled Fekete with dark forebodings for the current century. We can only hope that this crazy year won’t become characteristic of an entire era, as his year of birth...

Bob discusses three separate items all related to nonviolence: (1) Gene Sharp’s work, (2) Bob’s old dream of how to topple a tyrant, and (3) the winners of the Louis CK contest. Mentioned in the Episode and Other Links of Interest: Gene Sharp’s book, From Dictatorship to Democracy The trailer for the documentary “How to Start a Revolution” Sharp’s list of 198 methods of nonviolent action The original Louis CK clip that inspired Bob’s contest For more information,...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.22% to 1.1067 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, March 9(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: It is not clear the trigger, but risk-taking appetites rebounded smartly today after the NASDAQ completed a more than 10% pullback from its highs yesterday. Ironically, the Dow Jones Industrials set new record highs yesterday too. Most equity markets in the Asia Pacific region rallied....

Manufacturing constraints, not logistics, are holding up distribution of vaccines. Keystone / Zoltan Mathe More than half of adults in rich countries will still be waiting to receive a first dose of coronavirus vaccine in 15 months’ time, the head of a logistics group distributing jabs has warned. Detlef Trefzger, chief executive of Kuehne+Nagel, one of the world’s largest haulage companies, said: “This already is fast. This sounds shocking for some people, but we...

Swiss foreign trade in salt has plummeted since 2010. Over the past ten years, exports have plunged 91% to 6,084 tonnes and imports by 69%. In 2019 and 2020, the amount of salt imported was greater than that exported, a phenomenon that had not occurred since 2009. In 2020, salt exports totaled 6,084 tonnes, one eleventh from their 2010 level, or down 91% over the decade. They had not reached such a low level since 1991. Imports, for their part, have plummeted by...

Before we talk about Fedcoins, let’s look at the old school non-digital, non-blockchain, coin. Gold. And silver. Since January 4, the price has dropped about $244. And the price of silver has fallen about $4. Are these buying opportunities? Or the end of the brief gold bull market of 2020 (i.e. Covid)? It helps to return to the idea that gold is the unit of measure of value. Not as a rhetorical device to sell gold, but because it gives a clearer picture. If one...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.09% to 1.1083 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, March 8(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The attack on Saudi Arabia’s largest crude terminal reverberated through the capital markets, where sentiment was already fragile, despite the lack of disruption. Brent rose to nearly $71.40, and April WTI to almost $68 extended their gains for the fourth consecutive session before...

8. März 2021 – Jordan Peterson ist zurück, und die wichtigste Lektion aus seinem Buch bleibt so wichtig wie eh und je. von John Miltimore Vor fast zwei Jahren kauften Freunde für mich ein Exemplar des Bestsellers 12 Regeln fürs Leben von Jordan Peterson. Ich begann mit dem Lesen des Buches kurz nachdem ich es erhalten hatte, aber irgendwann wurde ich abgelenkt und las es nicht mehr fertig. (Das ist mir früher nie passiert, aber die Erziehung von drei Kindern hat...

The economic analysis of repudiation applies to the debt of all levels of government and to all countries. The central question is not how big the government is or how much it owes, but rather whether the debt is funded by taxes. Original Article: “The Economics and Ethics of Government Default, Part II” In the first installment of this series on government default, we examined the ethical status of the public debt and debt repudiation. Since the debt represents...