SNB & CHF

This was a slight downward revision. Nothing to cheer and really nothing to write home about. September Durable Goods were revised down .1% MoM in Sept and .05% MoM in Aug. Here’s a picture of Factory Orders. Looking at this time series, it’s almost as if the recession that has been 2 years in the waiting was merely coming off a covid fever sugar high. Orders briefly went negative, but now climbing. Let’s see if we can maintain the positive momentum from Q3, stay...

This article is a brief analysis of the US economic situation from the point of view of the Austrian School of Economics. It is strictly macroeconomic: a deductive hypothesis of what is happening in the aggregates. Let us place ourselves in the months immediately after the arrival of covid-19, the first quarter of 2020. As an economic policy measure, the US government decided to increase the money supply. Through different mechanisms, they put an unprecedented amount...

Is a true populist US government on the horizon? Probably not. Original Article: The Spirit of the Establishment Will Thrive under a “Populist Opposition” Government [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter

The big news in gold is two-fold right now; gold hit new all-time highs in several currencies and central bank demand for physical gold remains strong hitting a year-to date record in Q3 this year.  Gold at $2,000?  So whilst the headlines were all about dollar-denominated gold showing us that it’s still destined for levels north of $2,000 the real news is about other currencies and gold. Ahead of yesterday’s FOMC announcement the price of the yellow metal hit...

The New York Federal Reserve said on Tuesday, September 5, 2023, that the estimate for the neutral rate for Q2 has eased to 0.57 percent from 0.68 percent in Q1. Analysts typically translate that rate into a real-world setting by adding the neutral rate to the Fed’s 2 percent inflation target. The current reading suggests that a federal funds rate of around 2.5 percent would represent a neutral setting. Given that the Fed’s current target rate range is between 5.25...

Overview: We suspect that if Martians read the FOMC statement, which was nearly identical to the September statement and listened to Chair Powell, they would conclude there was nothing new. Yet, the market habitually hears Powell as dovish and this has weighed on rates and the dollar, while lifting risk appetites. Follow-through selling of the greenback has dragged it lower against all the major currencies, with the Antipodean leading the way, and nearly all the...

Part I of II by Claudio Grass, Hünenberg See, Switzerland To most observant citizens and diligent investors it is surely quite obvious that the current monetary, fiscal and banking system is inherently flawed, hopelessly unjust, corrupt, unsustainable and simply destined to collapse sooner or later. With every (predictable) recession and every (foreseeable) crisis, this structure gets weaker; its very own architects increasingly second-guess it, mistrust and...

While most economists admit that value is subjective, they still err by concentrating on scarcity and choice instead of purposeful action by individuals. Original Article: The Objective Science of Subjective Value [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter

Bloomberg reports that price inflation in Turkey was more than 60 percent in September. The 61.5 percent reading was released by the Turkish government’s statistical office. Being on the ground in Turkey for Hans-Hermann and Gülçin Hoppe’s Property and Freedom Society meeting, I can say the vibe was not hyperinflationary. The shelves are not empty and the port city of Bodrum is booming. Professor Hoppe told the crowd Bodrum has grown from a population of fifty...

Because Federal Reserve policies distort the economy and create perverse incentives, Disney also must deal with intellectual property issues. The combination of the two will ruin the Snow White story. Original Article: Thanks to the Combination of the Fed and IP, Snow White 2024 Is a Terrible Movie [embedded content]...