Tag Archives: currency

We will start this off with a pet peeve. Too often, one is reading something about gold. It starts off well enough, discussing problems with the dollar or the bond market or a real estate bubble… and them bam! Buy gold because the dollar is gonna be worthless! That number again is 1-800-BUY-GOLD or we have another 1-800-GOT-GOLD in case the lines on the first number are busy! Whether the writer is a bullion dealer, or...

This will serve mostly as an update to what is going on inside the Chinese monetary system. The PBOC’s balance sheet numbers for February 2019 are exactly what we’ve come to expect, ironically confirmed today on the domestic end by the FOMC’s dreaded dovishness. Therefore, rather than rewrite the same commentary for why this continues to happen I’ll just link to prior discussions (here’s another). China...

VoxEU, March 20, 2019, with Markus Brunnermeier. HTML. Both proponents and opponents have suggested that CBDC would fundamentally change the macroeconomy, either for the better or the worse. We question this paradigm. We derive an equivalence result according to which the introduction of CBDC need not alter the allocation nor the price system. And we argue that key concerns put forward in discussions about CBDC are misplaced. See also our VoxEU book chapter and my paper from last year.

VoxEU, March 20, 2019, with Markus Brunnermeier. HTML. Both proponents and opponents have suggested that CBDC would fundamentally change the macroeconomy, either for the better or the worse. We question this paradigm. We derive an equivalence result according to which the introduction of CBDC need not alter the allocation nor the price system. And we argue that key concerns put forward in discussions about CBDC are misplaced. See also our VoxEU book chapter and my paper from last year.

Newly elected Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently said that Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) absolutely needed to be “a larger part of our conversation.” Her comment shines a spotlight on MMT. So what is it? According to Wikipedia, it is: “a macroeconomic theory that describes the currency as a public monopoly and unemployment as the evidence that a currency monopolist is restricting the supply of the financial...

Last week, we joked that we don’t challenge beliefs. Here’s one that we want to challenge today: the dollar doesn’t work as a currency, because it’s losing value. Even the dollar’s proponents, admit it loses value. The Fed itself states that its mandate is price stability—which it admits means relentless two percent annual debasement (Orwell would be proud). So there is no question that the dollar loses value. The only...

China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reports that the country’s official manufacturing PMI in December 2018 dropped below 50 for the first time since the summer of 2016. Many if not most associate a number in the 40’s with contraction. While that may or not be the case, what’s more important is the quite well-established direction. Coming in at 49.4 in December, it’s down in a straight line from 51.3 in August....

There is some hope among those viewing bad news as good news. In China, where alarms are currently sounding the loudest, next week begins the plenary session for the State Council and its working groups. For several days, Communist authorities will weigh all the relevant factors, as they see them, and will then come up with the broad strokes for economic policy in the coming year (2019). We won’t know the full details...

December 2018. PDF. In: Ernest Gnan and Donato Masciandaro, editors, Do We Need Central Bank Digital Currency? Economics, Technology and Institutions, SUERF, The European Money and Finance Forum, Vienna, 2018. A short version of the CEPR working paper.

December 2018. PDF. In: Ernest Gnan and Donato Masciandaro, editors, Do We Need Central Bank Digital Currency? Economics, Technology and Institutions, SUERF, The European Money and Finance Forum, Vienna, 2018. A short version of the CEPR working paper.