Tag Archives: newsletter

Jay Powell’s disastrous week is coming to a close, not yet his long nightmare. He has been battling fed funds (meaning repo) for his entire tenure dating back to February 2018. This week wasn’t the conclusion to the contest, just the latest and biggest round of it. According to DTCC, the GC repo (UST) rate came back down to 1.975% today. That’s much less than the 3.000% yesterday and 6.007% on Tuesday. As yesterday, today’s unscheduled overnight repo operation...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.25% to 1.0932 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, September 20(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: A word of optimism on a Brexit deal has sent sterling to its best level in two months. Corporate tax cuts sparked a more than 5% rally in Indian stocks as the week draws to a close. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index snapped a four-day losing streak to pare this week’s decline.  Europe’s...

Current Account Key figures: Current Account: Down 2.07% against Q2/2018 to 21.3 bn. CHF of which Goods Trade Balance: Minus 1.52% against Q2/2018 to 14.24 bn. of which the Services Balance: Plus 0.85% to 4.72 bn. of which Investment Income: Minus 1.67% to 10.61 bn. CHF. Current Account Switzerland Q2 2019(see more posts on Switzerland Balance of Payments, Switzerland Capital Account, Switzerland Current Account, Switzerland Financial Account, ) Source: snb.ch...

We do not like Purchasing Power or Real Effective Exchange Rate (REER) as measurement for currencies. For us, the trade balance decides if a currency is overvalued. Only the trade balance can express productivity gains, while the REER assumes constant productivity in comparison to trade partners. Who has read Michael Pettis, knows that a rising trade surplus may also be caused by a higher savings rate while the trade partners decided to spend more. This is partially...

USD/CHF extends Thursday’s downpour, nears short-term key supports. An upside break of 0.9985 could recall June month highs. Given the failure to rise past-0.9980/85 area, USD/CHF carries the previous day’s declines while trading around 0.9913 ahead of the Europe markets open on Friday. The bearish signal from 12-bar moving average convergence and divergence (MACD) indicates brighter chances of pair’s further declines to 100-bar moving average on the four-hour chart,...

As expected, the Fed cut rates by 25 bp; the dollar firmed after the decision but has since given back some gains During the North American session, there will be a fair amount of US data BOE is expected to keep rates steady; UK reported August retail sales SNB and BOJ kept rates steady, as expected; Norges Bank unexpectedly hiked 25 bp Brazil cut rates 50 bp to 5.5%; Indonesia cut rates 25 bp to 5.25%; Taiwan kept rates steady at 1.375%; SARB is expected to remain...

© Georgerudy | Dreamstime.com As more baby-boomers – born from 1946 to 1964 – retire, Switzerland will faces a shortage of workers, according to Credit Suisse, a bank. Economists at the bank estimate that 1.1 million people in Switzerland will retire over the next 10 years, a figure which includes nearly 800,000 people currently working. By 2021, there will be more people leaving the job market than joining it. The current peak in Switzerland’s age pyramid is 55...

A corrupt Orthodoxy devoid of new ideas, an Orthodoxy devoted to maintaining the wealth, status and power of insiders regardless of cost, is a brittle, fragile, unstable system. When the ruling Elites sense their control of the populace is waning, they seek to regain full control via the imposition of a strict Orthodoxy, enforced by an Inquisition. We are living in just such an era. Everywhere we turn, a New Orthodoxy reigns. Dissent is blasphemy, and any narratives...

Swiss Franc The Euro has fallen by 0.22% to 1.0975 EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, September 19(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) - Click to enlarge FX Rates Overview: Central bank activity is still very much the flavor of the day, but investors are looking for the next focus. The Bank of Japan and the Swiss National Bank stood pat, while Indonesia cut for the third consecutive time and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and Saudi Arabia quickly followed the Fed. Brazil...

In spite of internal divisions, the Fed may go for a third rate cut in October and step in to alleviate pressure in repo market. The Federal Reserve (Fed) cut rates by 0.25% on Wednesday, as widely anticipated. The new fed funds target range is 1.75%-2.00%. The interest rate on banks’ excess reserves was cut by 0.30% to 1.80%. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell again justified this second rate cut since July as “insurance” against risks to the US outlook – mostly the weak...