Swiss investors launch $100m blockchain start-up factory

A consortium of Swiss investors has launched a private equity vehicle that aims to collect up to $100 million with the long-term goal of getting 1,000 blockchain companies off the ground internationally every year. The Swiss company Crypto Valley Venture Capital (CV VC) launched its initial “Genesis Hub” incubator in Zug, home to Switzerland’s Crypto Valley, on Thursday.

Le Conseil fédéral se moque des personnes âgées!

Le Conseil fédéral se distingue par 2 points tout compte fait complémentaires. Le premier est son soutien indéfectible à la politique expansionniste et ruineuse de la BNS, dont il a la responsabilité au plan constitutionnel. Celle-ci mobilise les richesses du pays, puis les convertit en monnaies étrangères, pour enfin les investir dans des actifs plus ou moins pourris, plus ou moins risqués, voire plus ou moins condamnés.

Trump’s Backdoor Power Play to Rein In the Fed

“Just run the presses – print money.” That’s what President Donald Trump supposedly instructed his former chief economic adviser Gary Cohn to do in response to the budget deficit. The quote appears in Bob Woodward’s controversial book Fear: Trump in the White House.

Italian material deprivation rates still the worst among large euro area economies

Latest poverty figures provide government with an argument for fiscal stumulus.Severe material deprivation rates gauge the proportion of people whose living conditions are severely affected by a lack of resources. According to Eurostat, “it represents the proportion of people living in households that cannot afford at least four of the following nine items: mortgage or rent payments, utility bills, hire purchase instalments or other loan...

Swiss investors launch $100m blockchain start-up factory

A consortium of Swiss investors has launched a private equity vehicle that aims to collect up to $100 million with the long-term goal of getting 1,000 blockchain companies off the ground internationally every year. The Swiss company Crypto Valley Venture Capital (CV VC) launched its initial “Genesis Hub” incubator in Zug, home to Switzerland’s Crypto Valley, on Thursday.

Portfolio Re-Balancing and the Dollar

Boosted by tax reform, deregulation, and strong earnings growth, US equities have motored ahead, leaving other benchmarks far behind. As the Great Graphic here shows, most of the other benchmarks are lower on the year. The S&P 500 (yellow line) is up 8.8% for the year before the new record highs seeing seen now, while the Dow Jones Stoxx 600 from Europe (purple line) is still off 1.7%.

Monthly Macro Monitor – September

This has already been one of the longest economic expansions on record for the US and there is little in the data or markets to indicate that is about to come to an end. Current levels of the yield curve are comparable to late 2005 in the last cycle. It was almost two years later before we even had an inkling of a problem and even in the summer of 2008 – nearly three years later – there was still a robust debate about whether the US could...

Digging into Wealth and Income Inequality

The assets of U.S. households recently topped $100 trillion, yet another sign that everything is going swimmingly in the U.S. economy. Let's take a look at the Federal Reserve's Household Balance Sheet, which lists the assets and liabilities of all U.S. households in very big buckets (real estate: $25 trillion). (For reasons unknown, the Fed lumps non-profit assets and liabilities with households, but these modest sums are easily subtracted.)

Impressive Swiss Recovery After SNB Peg Removal

Retail data shows that the SNB peg removal in January 2015 as early as April 2015 with minimal adverse impact on the economy. Trade surplus showed that Switzerland had fully recovered its lost trade surplus in May and expectations crossed an important threshold into positive territory in June. CHF strengthened since May end, as the market caught wind of the Swiss recovery, and the Grexit would further strengthen the CHF if it were to occur.

Swiss Franc History: Volcker’s defeat of inflation strengthens dollar, weakens Swiss franc

Richard Koo and Abenomics

Weak Yen, Is it Really a Currency War?

Some journalists, like Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of the U.K.'s Telegraph and Michael Casey of the Wall Street Journal, have already claimed this to be a shot in the currency wars. Casey focuses exclusively on the BOJ activity and does not even mention GPIF. Evans-Pritchard spends most of his time talking about the bearish yen implications of the increased BOJ purchases, and mentions GPIF only at the very end of the his essay, and even then to...