Tag Archives: Bank of Japan

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...

Collectively, the central bank sector claims to hold the world’s largest above ground gold bar stockpile, some 33,800 tonnes of gold bars. Individually within this group, some central banks claim to be the top holders of gold bullion in the world, with individual holdings in the thousands of tonnes range. This worldwide central bank group, also known as the official sector, spans central banks (such as the Deutsche...

The German Social Democrats have endorsed the Grand Coalition, ending the period of political uncertainty and paralysis in Germany since the last September’s election. The polls have suggested nearly 60% of the SPD would support joining the government and the actual outcome looks to be closer to 66%. In 2013, when the SPD had a similar vote, three-quarters favored a Grand Coalition. Among the differences is that the SPD...

It’s interesting, to me anyway, that an image of the Roman goddess Juno remains to this day on the logo of the Bank of England. There are many stories about her role as it relates to money, but what cannot be denied is that the very word itself came to us from her temple. The Latin moneta was derived from the word monere, a verb meaning to warn. Moneta was Juno’s surname. One fable has it where the goddess’s sacred...

The advent of open and transparent central banks is a relatively new one. For most of their history, these quasi-government institutions operated in secret and they liked it that way. As late as October 1993, for example, Alan Greenspan was testifying before Congress intentionally trying to cloud the issue as to whether verbatim transcripts of FOMC meetings actually existed. Representative Toby Roth (R-WI) quizzed the...

The US dollar has been marked lower since the middle of last month. It flies in the face strong growth, rising inflation expectations, and greater conviction that the Fed will continue to raise interest rates this year. Moreover, an oft-cited knock on the dollar, the widening current account, may be offset this year by the impact from US corporations repatriating earnings that have been kept offshore. Another weight on...

The G3 central banks are in flux.  The Federal Reserve is gradually raising rates and allowing the balance sheet to shrink by not fully reinvesting the maturing proceeds.  The ECB will purchase half as many bonds in the first nine months of 2018 as it did in the last nine months of 2017. While some observers are talking about a rate hike late this year, it seems highly unlikely.  The ECB has been clear that the...

The BoJ remains the last major central bank still firmly committed to large-scale monetary easing. After its Monetary Policy Meeting of December 21, the Bank of Japan (BoJ) announced its intention to keep its current monetary easing programme intact. The BOJ will continue with its “Quantitative and Qualitative Monetary Easing with Yield Curve Control ”, aiming to achieve and overshoot the core inflation target of 2%....

The BoJ remains the last major central bank still firmly committed to large-scale monetary easing.After its Monetary Policy Meeting of December 21, the Bank of Japan (BoJ) announced its intention to keep its current monetary easing programme intact. The BOJ will continue with its “Quantitative and Qualitative Monetary Easing with Yield Curve Control ”, aiming to achieve and overshoot the core inflation target of 2%.The reason for the BoJ deciding to stay put is the stubbornly low inflation...