Tag Archives: Featured

Larry Summers - Click to enlarge At an event in Davos, Switzerland earlier today, Former U.S. Treasury Secretary, Larry Summers, argued that Central Bank independence from national governments should be scrapped in favor of a coordinated effort between politicians, central bankers and treasury to engineer inflation.  Seems reasonable, right?…what could possibly go wrong? According to Market Watch, Summers argued that...

© Gerd Kohlmus | Dreamstime.com - Click to enlarge The promise of snow across the Alps this weekend won’t be enough to lift the gloom at some of Europe’s top ski resorts as the pound’s post-Brexit slide dents British bookings. Jon Fricker, a property developer in Beaconsfield, west of London, said some of his friends would probably back out of their annual piste reunion if the cost of a long weekend in the Portes du...

Can Saving Possibly “Undermine Economic Growth”? In his speech at the New York Federal Reserve of New York on October 5, 2016, the Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer has suggested  that a visible decline in the natural interest rate in the US could be on account of the world glut of saving. According to Fischer, both increased saving and reduced investments have potentially significantly lowered the...

Swiss Franc Currency Index As visible in the graph, the Swiss Franc index recovered most of its losses against the US Dollar Index for the last 30 days. In the last 30 days, both the USD currency index and the CHF currency index have had a positive performance. The USD dollar index still with a +1%, while the CHF index is finally slightly in positive territory. Clearly the major reason, is a new 6 month low on...

Is Stagflation a Potential Threat? The Incrementum Fund held its quarterly advisory board meeting on October 3 (the transcript can be downloaded below). Our regular participants – the two fund managers Ronald Stoeferle and Mark Valek, advisory board members Jim Rickards, Frank Shostak and yours truly –  were joined by special guest Grant Williams this time. Many of our readers probably know Grant; he is the author of...

Exposing the Clintons’ perfection of a corrupt political system won’t change the conditions and incentives that created the Clintons’ harvester of corruption. Let’s set aside Hillary Clinton as an individual and consider her as the perfection of a corrupt political system. As I noted yesterday, Politics As Usual Is Dead, and Hillary Clinton is the ultimate product of the political system that is disintegrating before...

Erroneous Expectations Many market observers are probably expecting crude oil prices to enter a seasonal uptrend due the beginning heating season. After all, the heating season in the Northern hemisphere means that energy consumption will rise. The effect of the heating season on demand is however offset by other factors, such as the use of alternative energy sources and fixed prices agreements made in advance. The...

Introduction by George Dorgan My articles About meMy booksFollow on:TwitterFacebookGoogle +YoutubeSeeking AlphaCFA SocietyLinkedINEconomicBlogs Summary: Not only is Carney not resigning, but he agreed to stay a year longer than initially agreed. He will stay for the two years that Brexit is negotiated. Sterling rallied, but did not challenge last week’s highs. Marc Carney Bank of England - Click to...

Introduction by George Dorgan My articles About meMy booksFollow on:TwitterFacebookGoogle +YoutubeSeeking AlphaCFA SocietyLinkedINEconomicBlogs Summary: Fed does not expand much on Sept. statement. Bar to December hike seems low. There were two rather than three dissents. FOMC - Click to enlarge The FOMC did not break new ground and the statement was as widely expected. It indicated that the case for...

The weekly speculative position shows increasing short positions on the euro and on the Swiss Franc. On the other side, both currencies have appreciated, what they should not do if net short positions increase. Therefore there is a different phenomenon.  Real money, .e.g in the form of cash, bonds, stocks or real estate that is invested in the euro area or in Switzerland. For Switzerland, we will see this in the...