Tag Archive: European Union

Europe Comes Apart, And That’s Before #4

2019-05-30

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2019-05-30

EU Pew Survey Overall
In May 2018, the European Parliament found that it was incredibly popular. Commissioning what it calls the Eurobarameter survey, the EU’s governing body said that two-thirds of Europeans inside the bloc believed that membership had benefited their own countries. It was the highest showing since 1983. Voters in May 2019 don’t appear to have agreed with last year’s survey.

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After May’s divorce deal: the road ahead for Brexit

2018-11-17

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2018-11-17

GBP/USD drops after Theresa May's cabinet approves the Eu divorce deal
But significant political challenges lie ahead before the 29 March deadline for Brexit. Sterling likely to be in the spotlight for several months.Theresa May’s cabinet has approved her divorce deal with the European Union (EU). A few cabinet secretaries have resigned, including Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab because the deal keeps the UK in a transitory ‘customs union’ with the EU, which in his view continues to give the EU too much influence on UK...

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Bubble Watch: Warning Signs That The Everything Bubble Will Burst in 2018

2017-12-20

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2017-12-20

Producer Price Indexes, Dec 2000 - 2017
I believe 2018 will be the year inflation arrives. The reason, as I’ve noted throughout mid-2017, is that multiple Central Banks, particularly the European Central Bank (ECB), Bank of Japan (BoJ) and Swiss National Bank (SNB) have maintained emergency levels of QE and money printing, despite the fact that globally the economy is performing relatively well.

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Buy Gold, Silver Time After Speculators Reduce Longs and Banks Reduce Shorts

2017-12-17

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2017-12-17

Concentration of Traders in the CFTC COTs
Gold and silver COT suggests bottoming and price rally coming. Speculators cut way back on long positions and added to short bets. Commercials/banks significantly reduced short positions. Commercial net short position saw biggest one-week decline in COMEX history. ‘Big 4’ commercial traders decreased their short positions by 28,800 contracts. Seasonally, January is generally a good month to own gold (see table). "If history is still reliable,...

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Year-end Rate Hike Once Again Proves To Be Launchpad For Gold Price

2017-12-15

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2017-12-15

Year-end rate hike once again proves to be launchpad for gold price. FOMC follows through on much anticipated rate-hike of 0.25%. Spot gold responds by heading for biggest gain in three weeks, rising by over 1%. Final meeting for Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen. Yellen does not expect Trump's tax-cut package to result in significant, strong growth for US economy. No concern for bitcoin which 'plays a very small role in the payment system'.

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What Gives Cryptocurrencies Their Value

2017-12-05

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2017-12-05

Number of Bitcoin Transactions
The value of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, just like any other kind of money, comes fundamentally from what you can do with it. As a follow up to What Backs Bitcoin, I want to dig into that value. The idea, which comes from Austrian economist Carl Menger, is that just as a shovel’s value comes from its ability to dig, a currency’s value comes from its ability to help you do two things: transactions and savings.

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Switzerland Less Attractive to European Migrants

2017-11-14

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2017-11-14

Fewer people are moving to Switzerland from elsewhere in Europe. Between January and September this year, immigration from European Union states was down by 26%, compared to the same period last year. (RTS/swissinfo.chexternal link)

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“This May Be The End Of Europe As We Know It”: The Pension Storm Is Coming

2017-10-13

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2017-10-13

World Population 65 years and older, 1990 - 2050
I’ve written a lot about US public pension funds lately. Many of them are underfunded and will never be able to pay workers the promised benefits - at least without dumping a huge and unwelcome bill on taxpayers. And since taxpayers are generally voters, it’s not at all clear they will pay that bill. Readers outside the US might have felt safe reading those stories. There go those Americans again… However, if you live outside the US, your country...

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Dollar Surge Continues Ahead Of Jobs Report; Europe Dips As Catalan Fears Return

2017-10-07

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2017-10-07

CBOE VIX Gauge, 1990 - 2019
World stocks eased back from record highs and fell for the first time in eight days, as jitters about Catalonia’s independence push returned while bets on higher U.S. interest rates sent the dollar to its highest since mid August; S&P 500 futures were modestly in the red - as they have been every day this week before levitating to record highs - ahead of hurricane-distorted nonfarm payrolls data (full preview here). U.S. jobs report will also be...

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“This Is A Crisis Greater Than Any Government Can Handle”: The $400 Trillion Global Retirement Gap

2017-10-03

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2017-10-03

Size of the retirement savings gap, 2015 - 2050
Today we’ll continue to size up the bull market in governmental promises. As we do so, keep an old trader’s slogan in mind: “That which cannot go on forever, won’t.” Or we could say it differently: An unsustainable trend must eventually stop. Lately I have focused on the trend in US public pension funds, many of which are woefully underfunded and will never be able to pay workers the promised benefits, at least without dumping a huge and unwelcome...

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Boris Johnson Threatens To Resign If Theresa May “Goes Against His Brexit Demands”, Pound Rises

2017-09-21

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2017-09-21

Boris Johnson
In confirmation that Theresa May's upcoming Florence speech this Friday is not only what many have called "the most important day for Brexit since the referendum", but also the most opaque, the Telegraph reports that UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson will resign as before the weekend if Theresa May veers towards a “Swiss-style” arrangement with the EU in her upcoming speech.

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Bitcoin Fork, Hyped ICOs – Immutable Gold and Silver

2017-08-16

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2017-08-16

Latest developments show risks in crypto currencies. Confusion as bitcoin may split tomorrow. SEC stepped into express concern over ICOs. ICOs have so far raised $1.2 billion in 2017. ICOs preying on lack of understanding from investors. Physical gold not vulnerable to technological risk. Beauty and safety in simplicity of gold and silver.

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When Do We Know These Are Delusional Markets

2017-07-27

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2017-07-27

Markets Cycle
Signs of complacency and disconnect from fundamentals abound. So to sanity check, it may still be helpful to periodically remind ourselves of a few recent ones. In no particular order. The Swiss National Bank bought $ 100bn between US and European stocks. It now owns 26 million Microsoft shares (read).

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London Property Bubble Bursting? UK In Unchartered Territory On Brexit and Election Mess

2017-06-30

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2017-06-30

UBS Global Real Estate Bubble Index
Is the London property market heading for tough times? The most recent housing figures and a new Bank of England report suggest it may well be. Recent figures show that 77% of London houses sold in May went at below asking price, up from 72% in April.

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Shrinkflation – Real Inflation Much Higher Than Reported

2017-06-29

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2017-06-29

Shrinkflation
600 new words entered our official lexicon this week as the Oxford English Dictionary announced the latest new additions to their online records.

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How The US Government Let A Giant Bank Pin A Scandal On A Former Employee

2017-05-12

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2017-05-12

UBS Zurich
The following is an excerpt from David Enrich's nonfiction financial and legal thriller The Spider Network: The Wild Story of a Math Genius, a Gang of Backstabbing Bankers, and One of the Greatest Scams in Financial History. (Read part of the prologue here; another excerpt can be found here) This excerpt takes place shortly after the accused mastermind of the Libor scandal, Tom Hayes, is fired from his job at Citigroup, kicking government...

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Sweden’s Gold Reserves: 10,000 gold bars (pet rocks) shrouded in Official Secrecy

2017-04-28

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2017-04-28

In February 2017 while preparing for a presentation in Gothenburg about central bank gold, I emailed Sweden’s central bank, the Riksbank, enquiring whether the Riksbank physically audits Sweden’s gold and whether it would provide me with a gold bar weight list of Sweden’s gold reserves (gold bar holdings). The Swedish official gold reserves are significant and amount to 125.7 tonnes, making the Swedish nation the world’s 28th largest official gold...

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Euro Saves Germany, Slaughters the PIGS, & Feeds the BLICS

2017-04-06

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2017-04-06

European Population vs. Total Europe Energy Consumption
The change in nations Core populations (25-54yr/olds) have driven economic activity for the later half of the 20th century, first upward and now downward. The Core is the working population, the family forming population, the child bearing population, the first home buying, and the credit happy primary consumer. Even a small increase (or contraction) in their quantity drives economic activity magnitudes beyond what the numbers would indicate.

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Blocher and the People That Ruined the EU

2017-03-30

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2017-03-30

Christoph Blocher
Last weekend, European leaders gathered in Rome for the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome. They discussed, not for the first time, how to get the EU back on track. And they told each other they are still committed to the Union and believe in its future. (We’ve heard that one before, too.)

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Here Are The Best Hedges Against A Le Pen Victory

2017-02-13

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2017-02-13

France "Risk" Over Germany
On Friday, after it emerged that as part of Marine Le Pen's strategic vision for France, should she win, is a return to the French franc as well as redenomination of some €1.7 billion in French (non-international law) bonds, both rating agencies and economists sounded the alarm, warning it would "amount to the largest sovereign default on record, nearly 10 times larger than the €200bn Greek debt restructuring in 2012, threatening chaos to the world...

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