The global bond rout returned with a bang, sending 10Y US Treasury yields as much as six basis points higher to 2.53%, the highest level in over two years. The selloff happened as oil prices surged by more than 5% following Saturday’s agreement by NOPEC nations agreed to slash production, leading to rising inflation pressures. At last check, the 10Y was trading at 2.505%, up from 2.462% at Friday and on track for its...
Read More »Swiss 10 year bond yields still negative, but approaching zero.
The global bond rout returned with a bang, sending 10Y US Treasury yields as much as six basis points higher to 2.53%, the highest level in over two years. The selloff happened as oil prices surged by more than 5% following Saturday’s agreement by NOPEC nations agreed to slash production, leading to rising inflation pressures. At last check, the 10Y was trading at 2.505%, up from 2.462% at Friday and on track for its...
Read More »How Problematic Is a Large Central Bank Balance Sheet?
On his blog, John Cochrane reports about a Hoover panel including him, Charles Plosser, and John Taylor. Cochrane focuses on the liability side. He favors a large quantity of (possibly interest bearing) reserves for financial stability reasons. Plosser focuses on the asset side and is worried about credit allocation by the Fed, for political economy reasons. Taylor favors a small balance sheet. Cochrane also talks about reserves for everyone, but issued by the Treasury.
Read More »The War On Cash Is Happening Faster Than We Could Have Imagined
Submitted by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com, It’s happening faster than we could have ever imagined. Every time we turn around, it seems, there’s another major assault in the War on Cash. India is the most notable recent example– the embarrassing debacle a few weeks ago in which the government, overnight, “demonetized” its two largest denominations of cash, leaving an entire nation in chaos. But there have been...
Read More »Bernanke Suggests How to Use the Dot Plots
Summary: The dot plots are not FOMC commitments or an aggregate view of the FOMC. They are a collection of individual economic forecasts based on the most likely scenario and their view of appropriate policy. The SEP is useful for understanding how Fed officials view the long-term economic parameters, which appears to explain the downward shift in the long-term equilibrium rate for Fed funds. Former Fed chief...
Read More »Bernanke Suggests How to Use the Dot Plots
Summary: The dot plots are not FOMC commitments or an aggregate view of the FOMC. They are a collection of individual economic forecasts based on the most likely scenario and their view of appropriate policy. The SEP is useful for understanding how Fed officials view the long-term economic parameters, which appears to explain the downward shift in the long-term equilibrium rate for Fed funds. Former Fed chief...
Read More »Roger Farmer’s “Prosperity for All”
On his blog, Roger Farmer advertizes his new book, “Prosperity for All,” and argues that governments should stabilize asset prices: Following the Great Stagflation of the 1970s, economists backtracked and revived the classical economic theory that had dominated academic economics for a hundred and fifty years, beginning with Adam Smith in 1776 and culminating in the business cycle theory described by Keynes’s contemporary Arthur Pigou in his 1927 book, Industrial Fluctuations. That...
Read More »BIS: The VIX is Dead, The Dollar is the new “Fear Indicator”
Over the past few years, one of the recurring themes on this website has been an ongoing discussion of how the VIX has lost its predictive value as a market risk indicator. This culminated recently with a note by Russel Clark who explained in clear term why the “VIX is now broken.” Today, in a fascinating note Hyun Song Shin, head of research at the Bank for International Settlements, the “central banks’ central bank”...
Read More »Did President-Elect Trump Just Inadvertently Kill The Golden Goose?
Submitted by Gordon T Long via MATASII.com, President-Elect Trump may have just unwittingly sowed the seed of an equity market draw-down which will send even more protesters into the streets of America. Donald Trump’s stated economic policies are clearly pro-growth and if he manages to implement his pro-business, anti-regulation agenda, in the longer term they have the potential to surpass the bold and successful...
Read More »SMI up on post Trump rally
SMI Swiss stocks continued to rise this week, in line with other global stocks thanks to a strong performance from financials which gained as investors weighted the prospects of higher interest rates in the US. SMI Index, November 18 - Click to enlarge Economic Data Stocks in the financial sector advanced after Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen said the US central bank is close to lifting interest rates as the...
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