Tag Archive: FOMC

FX Daily, July 29: Greenback Slips Ahead of the FOMC

2020-07-29

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2020-07-29

Global equity markets are stabilizing today, and the dollar is once again on its back foot. Chinese markets led a mixed regional performance with a 2%-3% gain, while South Korea and Hong Kong markets also advancing. The strength of the yen appears to weigh on Japanese shares.

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Wait A Minute, What’s This Inversion?

2020-06-28

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2020-06-28

Eurodollar Futures Curve, 2018-2024
Back in the middle of 2018, this kind of thing was at least straight forward and intuitive. If there was any confusion, it wasn’t related to the mechanics, rather most people just couldn’t handle the possibility this was real. Jay Powell said inflation, rate hikes, and accelerating growth. Absolutely hawkish across-the-board.And yet, all the way back in the middle of June 2018 the eurodollar curve started to say, hold on a minute.

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This Thing Is Only Getting Started; Or, *All* The V’s Are Light On The Right

2020-06-14

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2020-06-14

The Federal Reserve’s models really are the most optimistic of the bunch. With the policy meeting conducted today, no surprises as far as policies go, we now know what ferbus has to say about everything that’s happened this year. Skipping the usual March projections, what with the FOMC totally occupied at the time by a complete global monetary meltdown Jay Powell now says “we saw it coming”, the central bank staff released the calculations...

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Why The FOMC Just Embraced The Stock Bubble (and anything else remotely sounding inflationary)

2020-06-14

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2020-06-14

Mainstream Models World Bank
The job, as Jay Powell currently sees it, means building up the S&P 500 as sky high as it can go. The FOMC used to pay lip service to valuations, but now everything is different. He’ll signal to all those fund managers by QE raising bank reserves, leading them on in what they all want to believe is “money printing” (that isn’t).

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So Much Bond Bull

2020-05-21

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2020-05-21

Count me among the bond vigilantes. On the issue of supply I yield (pun intended) to no one. The US government is the brokest entity humanity has ever conceived – and that was before March 2020. There will be a time, if nothing is done, where this will matter a great deal.That time isn’t today nor is it tomorrow or anytime soon because it’s the demand side which is so confusing and misdirected.

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The Global Engine Is Still Leaking

2020-04-16

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2020-04-16

Federal Reserve: Liabilities & Capital, 1984-2019
An internal combustion engine that is leaking oil presents a difficult dilemma. In most cases, the leak itself is obscured if not completely hidden. You can only tell that there’s a problem because of secondary signs and observations.If you find dark stains underneath your car, for example, or if your engine smells of thick, bitter unpleasantness, you’d be wise to consider the possibility.

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A Day For Rate Cuts

2020-03-04

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2020-03-04

Total Credit Market, 1980-2015
Well, that wasn’t he had in mind. The whole point of a rate cut, any rate cut let alone an emergency fifty, is to signal especially the stock market that the Fed is in the business of…something. The public has been led, by and large, to assume that something good happens when the Fed Chair shows up on TV.

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History Shows You Should Infer Nothing From Powell’s Pause

2020-02-02

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2020-02-02

The Fed Midpoint, 2007-2008
Jay Powell says that three’s not a crowd, at least not for his rate cuts, but four would be. As usual, central bankers like him always hedge and say that “should conditions warrant” the FOMC will be more than happy to indulge (the NYSE). But what he means in his heart of hearts is that there probably won’t be any need.

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The FOMC Channels China’s Xi As To Japan Going Global

2019-12-13

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2019-12-13

Economic Projections FOMC, 2013-2016
The massive dollar eruption in the middle of 2014 altered everything. We’ve talked quite a lot about what Euro$ #3 did to China; it sent that economy into a dive from which it wouldn’t escape. And in doing so convinced the Chinese leadership to give growth one more try before changing the game entirely once stimulus inevitably failed.

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Three (Rate Cuts) And GDP, Where (How) Does It End?

2019-11-01

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2019-11-01

The Real GDP Problem,1988-2018
The Federal Reserve has indicated that it will now pause – for a second time, supposedly. Remember the first: after raising its benchmark rates apparatus in December while still talking about an inflationary growth acceleration requiring even more hikes throughout 2019, in a matter of weeks that was transformed into a temporary suspension of them.

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FX Daily, October 31: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

2019-10-31

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2019-10-31

Overview: The equity and bond rally in North America yesterday carried over into today's session. With some notable exceptions, like China, Taiwan, Australia, and Indonesia, most bourses in Asia Pacific and Europe traded higher. US shares are little changed in early Europe after the S&P 500 rose to new record highs.

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Waiting on the Calvary

2019-09-26

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2019-09-26

WTO Global Trade, 2007-2019
Engaged in one of those protectionist trade spats people have been talking about, the flow of goods between South Korea and Japan has been choked off. The specific national reasons for the dispute are immaterial. As trade falls off everywhere, countries are increasingly looking to protect their own. Nothing new, this is a feature of when prolonged stagnation turns to outright contraction.

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The Path Clear For More Rate Cuts, If You Like That Sort of Thing

2019-08-15

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2019-08-15

U.S. Gasoline Stocks, 2012-2019
If you like rate cuts and think they are powerful tools to help manage a soft patch, then there was good news in two international oil reports over the last week. The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) cut its forecast for global demand growth for the seventh straight month. On Friday, the International Energy Agency (IEA) downgraded its estimates for the third time in four months.

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Seven Points on the ECB and the Price Action

2019-07-27

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2019-07-27

Confusion
As soon as it was clear that the ECB was not easing today, the euro began to recover, after making a marginal new low for the year (just above $1.11). Draghi made it clear that easing was going to be delivered in September and on several fronts including rates (with mitigating measures like tiering) and new asset purchases (not decided on instruments, which plays into speculation of equity purchases—though I strongly doubt this will materialize).

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What Does It Mean That Real Estate, Not Equities, Is Driving Monetary Policy?

2019-07-25

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2019-07-25

New Home Sales Population Adjusted, 1987-2019
In the world of assets classes, I don’t believe it is equities which hold the Federal Reserve’s attention. After the 2006-11 debacle, the big bust, you can at least understand why policymakers might be more attuned to real estate no matter how the NYSE trades. It may be a decade ago, but that’s the one thing out of the Global Financial Crisis which was seared into the consciousness of everyone who lived through it.

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FX Daily, June 19: Still Patient?

2019-06-19

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2019-06-19

Overview:  Risk-taking was bolstered by the dramatic shift in Draghi's rhetoric less than two weeks after the ECB meeting and a Trump's tweet announcing that there was going to be an  "extended" meeting between him and Xi at the G20 meeting and that the respective staff would begin coordinating. It was later confirmed by the Chinese media.

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The Transitory Story, I Repeat, The Transitory Story

2019-05-24

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2019-05-24

Money Markets Equivalents, 2017-2019
Understand what the word “transitory” truly means in this context. It is no different than Ben Bernanke saying, essentially, subprime is contained. To the Fed Chairman in early 2007, this one little corner of the mortgage market in an otherwise booming economy was a transitory blip that booming economy would easily withstand. Just eight days before Bernanke would testify confidently before Congress, the FOMC had met to discuss their lying eyes....

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FX Daily, May 22: Sterling Can’t Get Out of Its Own Way

2019-05-22

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2019-05-22

Overview:   There is a nervous calm in the capital markets.  Yesterday's rally in US shares failed to excite global investors.  China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan markets fell, while Japan was mixed. Foreign investors continued to sell Korean shares, but the Kospi rose.  European shares narrowly mixed, leaving the Dow Jones Stoxx 600 little changed.

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Global Doves Expire: Fed Pause Fizzles (US Retail Sales)

2019-05-18

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2019-05-18

Retail Sales, NSA 2010-2019
Before the stock market’s slide beginning in early October, for most people they heard the economy was booming, the labor market was unbelievably good, an inflationary breakout just over the horizon. Jay Powell did as much as anyone to foster this belief, chief caretaker to the narrative. He and his fellow central bankers couldn’t use the word “strong” enough.

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FX Daily, May 01: No Help on May Day, which is also Fed Day

2019-05-01

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2019-05-01

The May Day holiday has shut most markets in Asia and Europe, making for subdued market action. Equity markets that are open, like Australia and the UK, advanced and US shares are trading higher helped by Apple's upbeat forecasts and sales that beat expectations.

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