Tag Archives: Bank of Japan

As I wrote yesterday, “In the West, consumer prices overall are pushed around by oil. In the East, by food.” In neither case is inflation buoyed by “money printing.” Central banks both West and East are doing things, of course, but none of them amount to increasing the effective supply of money. Failure of inflation, more so economy, the predictable cost. In yesterday’s article the topic in the East was China. Today,...

The real question is why no one says anything. They can continue to make these grossly untrue, often contradictory statements without fear of having to explain themselves. Don’t even think about repercussions. Even in front of politicians ostensibly being there on behalf of the public, pedigree still matters more than results. It’s actually worse than that since all that I’m talking about means it is these guys who...

Swiss Franc The Euro has risen by 0.11% to 1.1588 CHF. EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, August 01(see more posts on EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Investors recognize the risks to growth posed by the tariffs and counter-tariffs being imposed, but the way the US is going about it is also disconcerting. Within a few hours of signals that the US and China were looking to re-engage...

Swiss Franc The Euro has risen by 0.15% to 1.1582 CHF. EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, July 31(see more posts on EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates The Japanese yen has been sold following the adjustments to policy and outlook by the BOJ that will allow the unconventional policies continue for an “extended period of time.” Cross rate pressure and month-end demand have lifted the...

The week ahead sees three major central bank meetings and the US employment report. It will likely be the most important work before a hiatus that runs through the end of August.  Of course, and perhaps more than ever, market participants are well aware that the US President’s communication and penchant for disruption is a bit of a wild card. That said, the equity market has learned to take individual company references...

Note: This will be a short update. We are shifting the timing of some of our reports. The monthly Global Asset Allocation update will now be published in the first week of the month, aiming for the first of each month. I’ll put out a full report next week. The Bi-Weekly Economic Review is shifting to a monthly update, published on the 15th of each month. We are doing this to make room for some new reports, podcasts and...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.29% to 1.1597 CHF. EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, July 26(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates The dollar is mostly firmer. The Australian dollar is off the most (~0.35%, ~$0.7425), after peaking a little above $0.7460. The price action reinforces the $0.7300-$0.7500 range. The yen is the strongest of the majors. Near JPY110.80, the yen...

Back in February, Japan’s Cabinet Office reported that Real GDP in Japan had grown in Q4 2017 for the eighth consecutive quarter. It was the longest streak of non-negative GDP since the 1980’s. Predictably, this was hailed as some significant achievement, a true masterstroke of courage and perseverance. It was taken as a sign that Abenomics and QQE was finally working (never mind the four years). Those making that...

Thomas Hoenig was President of the Federal Reserve’s Kansas City branch for two decades. He left that post in 2011 to become Vice Chairman of the FDIC. Before that, Mr. Hoenig as a voting member of the FOMC in 2010 cast the lone dissenting vote in each of the eight policy meetings that year (meaning he was against QE2, too). This makes him, apparently, the hawk of all hawks. In January 2011, in his capacity as still...

Japanese industrial production dropped sharply in January 2018, Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry reported last month. Seasonally-adjusted, the IP index fell 6.8% month-over-month from December 2017. Since the country has very little mining sector to speak of, and Japan’s IP doesn’t include utility output, this was entirely manufacturing in nature (99.79% of the IP index is derived from the manufacturing...