Tag Archives: Featured

One day short of one year ago, on September 16, 2019, China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reported its updated monthly estimates for the Big 3 accounts. Industrial Production (IP) is a closely-watched indicator as it is relatively decent proxy for the entire goods economy around the world. Retail Sales in the post-Euro$ #2 context give us a sense of the Chinese economy’s persistent struggle to try to “rebalance” without the pre-2008 boost China had obtained...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.19% to 1.0755 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, September 15(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: The capital markets are relatively quiet so far today as the FOMC meeting gets underway. Equity markets in the Asia Pacific region, but Japan and Australia advanced, and the regional benchmark rose for the fourth consecutive session. European stocks are a little firmer. The...

© Octavian Lazar | Dreamstime.com A report published this week places Switzerland fourth on a list of countries best positioned to make an economic rebound after the coronavirus downturn. The analysis looks at overall health resilience, pre-existing structural strengths and weaknesses in 122 countries. The top four nations are Finland, Norway, Germany and Switzerland. These countries combine world class governance with high levels of social capital and high social...

In the early days of the coronavirus crisis, the rationale given for lockdowns was that it was necessary to stay at home for “fifteen days to slow the spread.” The idea was that social distancing was necessary so that hospitals and other healthcare resources would not be overwhelmed. However, by the summer of 2020, whether by design or not, it became common to hear media pundits, politicians, and even some scientists either imply or outright claim that social...

There is no oil in the CPI’s consumer basket, yet oil prices largely determine the rate by which overall consumer prices are increasing (or not). WTI sets the baseline which then becomes the price of motor fuel (gasoline) becoming the energy segment. As energy goes, so do headline CPI measurements. CPI Changes on Energy, 1995-2020 - Click to enlarge And that’s a huge problem…if you are Jay Powell. We’ve been making a big deal out of him making a huge deal out of...

The US Dollar Index has lost 10 percent from its March highs and many press comments have started to speculate about the likely collapse of the US dollar as world reserve currency due to this weakness. These wild speculations need to be debunked. The US dollar year-to-date (August 2020) has strengthened relative to 96 out of 146 currencies in the Bloomberg universe. In fact, the US Fed Trade-Weighted Broad Dollar Index has strengthened by 2.3 percent in the same...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.07% to 1.0762 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, September 14(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: A flurry of deals, including the still-evolving Oracle-TikTok tie-up, helped lift equity markets in the Asia Pacific region.  South Korea’s Kospi, and Indonesia, which had been battered last week, led the advance. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose for the third consecutive...

The most famous Austrian economist is 1974 Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek. Because of his moderate views excusing state interventions in various circumstances, hardcore Rothbardians tend to regard Hayek as less than pure in many areas. However, one area where Hayek is certainly more radical (though perhaps not correct!) than even Murray Rothbard is monetary institutions, as detailed in his fascinating (1978) pamphlet The Denationalisation of Money. When it comes to...

Swiss Tourism IndustryWith only three months to go before the start of the winter season, the de facto holiday ban for guests from certain high risk countries is causing huge concern for the Swiss tourism industry. Keystone / Jean-christophe Bott - Click to enlarge Foreign visitors from Covid-19 high risk countries should be able to travel to Switzerland with negative corona tests and not have to go into quarantine, say tourism officials. Under Swiss regulations,...

When the money runs out or loses its purchasing power, all sorts of complexity that were previously viewed as essential crumble to dust.Four D’s will define 2020-2025: derealization, denormalization, decomplexification and decoherence. That’s a lot of D’s. Let’s take them one at a time. I use the word derealization to describe the inner disconnect between what we experience and what the propaganda / marketing complex we live in tells us we should be experiencing....