SNB & CHF

Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) failed on Friday and was shut down by regulators. It was the second-largest failure in US history and the first since the global financial crisis. Almost immediately, the calls for bailouts started to come in. (Since Friday, First Republic Bank has failed, and many other banks are facing collapse.) In fact, on March 9, even before SVB failed, billionaire investor Bill Ackman took to Twitter to insist a federal “bailout should be considered”...

Two "distinguished" healthcare analysts have examined the medical system in the USA and conclude that the REAL problem is . . . large hospitals. Dale Steinreich applies economic analysis to their claims. Original Article: "Are Large Hospitals the Problem with US Healthcare?" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.  [embedded content]...

The second-largest collapse of a bank in recent history after Lehman Brothers could have been prevented. Now the impact is too large, and the contagion risk is difficult to measure. The demise of the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) is a classic bank run driven by a liquidity event, but the important lesson for everyone is that the enormity of the unrealized losses and the financial hole in the bank’s accounts would not have existed if not for ultra-loose monetary policy....

Keynesians and other economists believe the central bank can influence economic growth via monetary policy but that it may bring inflation. Thus, if the goal is faster economic growth and lower unemployment, then the economy may pay the price with a higher inflation rate. There is supposedly a tradeoff between inflation and unemployment, described by the Phillips curve: the lower the unemployment rate, the higher the rate of inflation; conversely, higher unemployment...

While the Biden White House claims we are on a steady course of prosperity, the more realistic future is that of a global recession. Original Article: "The Coming Recession Will Be a Global One" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.  [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter

If AI isn’t self-aware of the fact it is nothing but an exploitive tool of the powerful, then it’s worthless. The latest wave of AI tools is generating predictably giddy exaltations. These range from gooey, gloppy technocratic worship of the new gods (“AI will soon walk on water!”) to the sloppy wet kisses of manic fandom (“AI cleaned up my code, wrote my paper on quantum physics and cured my sensitive bowel!”) The hype obscures the fundamental reality that all...

Ryan McMaken and Tho Bishop look at how the regime's narrative on foreign policy is failing, and how some in Congress are finally standing up to the warfare state. Yet, the regime wants more US wars in Syria, Ukraine, and now even Mexico. And you will pay for it all. Will the voters demand a more sane foreign policy in 2024? [embedded content] Recommended Reading "The Costs of War in Syria" by Ryan McMaken (2013): Mises.org/RR_124_A "A Permanent Wartime...

The Censored Generation Incredulity. Astonishment. Disgust. Anger. It is these feelings—amongst others—that describe the general reaction to the revelations of the Twitter Files and other egregious episodes of Big Tech censorship of the electronic public square. The implicit deal with companies like Twitter, Facebook, Google, etc. is very simple: we will look at your ads if you give us a service for free. The deal did not include censorship. But what is society to...

Don’t feel bad if MSC, the Mediterranean Shipping Company, is the biggest ocean-going carrier you have never heard of. It is meant to be that way. Its founder, Gianluigi Aponte, is a publicity-shy Italian billionaire, based in Switzerland, a country with no maritime borders and a culture of secrecy as deep as the ocean. His firm has taken the seafaring world by stealth. Born in 1970 with a single vessel trading between Somalia and southern Italy, msc last year...

As the Biden administration continues to inflate the dollar, other nations are questioning the existence of the petrodollar. Original Article: "Saudi Arabia’s Quandary: The End of the Petrodollar" This Audio Mises Wire is generously sponsored by Christopher Condon.  [embedded content] Tags: Featured,newsletter