Tag Archive: Great Depression

Hong Kong Stocks Pivot Euro$ #5

2022-05-28

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2022-05-28

The stock market hasn’t been moneyed; well, US equities, anyway. What do I mean by “moneyed?” Common perceptions (myth) link the Federal Reserve’s so-called money printing (bank reserves) with share prices.

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As The Fed Tapers: What If More Rapid (published) Wage Increases Are Actually Evidence of *Deflationary* Conditions?

2022-01-05

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2022-01-05

Since the Federal Reserve is not in the money business, their recent hawkish shift toward an increasingly anti-inflationary stance is a twisted and convoluted case of subjective interpretation.

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GDP + GFC = Fragile

2020-05-01

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2020-05-01

March 15 was when it all began to come down. Not the stock market; that had been in freefall already, beset by the rolling destruction of fire sale liquidations emanating out of the repo market (collateral side first). No matter what the Federal Reserve did or announced, there was no stopping the runaway devastation.

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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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Swiss Mystery: Someone Keeps Flushing €500 Bank Notes Down The Toilet

2017-09-22

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2017-09-22

While there are several comments one can make here, “dirty money”, “flush with cash” and “flushing money down the toilet” certainly coming to mind, perhaps the ECB was on to something when it warned that €500 “Bin Laden” bills (which it has since discontinued to print) tend to be used by criminals. The reason for … Continue reading »

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Toward The Housing Bubble, Or Great Depression?

2017-09-08

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2017-09-08

US Personal Savings Rate, Jan 2000 - 2017
During the middle 2000’s, one more curious economic extreme presented itself in an otherwise ocean of extremes. Though economists were still thinking about the Great “Moderation”, the trend for the Personal Savings Rate was anything but moderate, indicated a distinct lack of modesty on the part of consumers. In early 2006, the Bureau of Economic Analysis calculated that the rate had been negative for all of 2005. It was the first time in seventy...

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The Secret History Of The Banking Crisis

Accounts of the financial crisis leave out the story of the secretive deals between banks that kept the show on the road. How long can the system be propped up for? It is a decade since the first tremors of what would become the Great Financial Crisis began to convulse global markets. Across the world from China and South Korea, to Ukraine, Greece, Brexit Britain and Trump’s America it has shaken our economy, our society and latterly our politics.

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Swiss Banks Paid Out €1 Billion In Negative Interest Rates In The First Half

2017-08-01

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2017-08-01

Investment Structure at the end of Q2 2017
Overnight, the Swiss National Bank disclosed the composition and breakdown of its FX reserves as of June 30. There were no notable changes, as the central bank kept most of its asset allocations unchanged from the previous quarter, with equities, government bonds and "other bonds", at 20%, 68% and 12% respectively. There were also no shifts in the currency composition as shown in the table below.

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Not Recession, Systemic Rupture – Again

2017-02-25

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2017-02-25

Pyramid - Total US Gold Stock, January 2017
For the very few in the mainstream of economics who venture further back in history than October 1929, they typically still don’t go much last April 1925. And when they do, it is only to further bash the gold standard for its presumed role in creating the conditions for 1929. The Brits under guidance of Winston Churchill made a grave mistake, one from which gold advocates could never recover given what followed.

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Policy Makers – Like Generals – Are Busy Fighting The Last War

2017-01-25

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2017-01-25

Total Global Population
The Maginot Line formed France's main line of defense on its German facing border from Belgium in the North to Switzerland in the South. It was constructed during the 1930s, with the trench-based warfare of World War One still firmly in the minds of the French generals. The Maginot Line was an absolute success...as the Germans never seriously attempted to attack it's interconnected series of underground fortresses. But the days of static warfare...

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Nomi Prins’ Political-Financial Road Map For 2017

2017-01-05

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2017-01-05

2017 Just Ahead
As tumultuous as last year was from a global political perspective on the back of a rocky start market-wise, 2017 will be much more so. The central bank subsidization of the financial system (especially in the US and Europe) that began with the Fed invoking zero interest rate policy in 2008, gave way to international distrust of the enabling status quo that unfolded in different ways across the planet.

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We Know How This Ends – Part 2

2016-12-23

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2016-12-23

History Most Definitely Rhymes
In March 1969, while Buba was busy in the quicksand of its swaps and forward dollar interventions, Netherlands Bank (the Dutch central bank) had instructed commercial banks in Holland to pull back funds from the eurodollar market in order to bring up their liquidity positions which had dwindled dangerously during this increasing currency chaos.

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Who Has To Work The Longest To Afford An iPhone?

2016-12-13

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2016-12-13

Time Required for Iphone 6
How many hours must you work to buy a new iPhone? It varies dramatically around the world, reflecting disparities in productivity and purchasing power. According to a recent report by UBS that aims to measure well-being by estimating how many minutes workers in various countries must work to afford either an iphone, a Big Mac, a kilo of bread or a kilo of rice, the average worker in Zurich or New York can buy an iPhone 6 in under three working days.

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Jim Grant Puzzled by the actions of the SNB

2016-10-27

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2016-10-27

James Grant, Wall Street expert and editor of the investment newsletter «Grant’s Interest Rate Observer», warns of a crash in sovereign debt, is puzzled over the actions of the Swiss National Bank and bets on gold.

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Best Countries To Store Gold: How Did America, A Serial Defaulter, Make The Cut?

An era of slowing growth, falling corporate profits, record debt levels, and currency debauchment has many investors buying gold as a bet against global central banks. Holding that gold outside the banking system, and for some, outside one’s own country, are increasingly popular options. Canada, Switzerland, and four other countries have particularly attractive characteristics.

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Best Countries To Store Gold (How Did America, A Serial Defaulter, Make The Cut?)

2016-08-09

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2016-08-09

An era of slowing growth, falling corporate profits, record debt levels, and currency debauchment has many investors buying gold as a bet against global central banks. Holding that gold outside the banking system, and for some, outside one’s own country, are increasingly popular options. Canada, Switzerland, and four other countries have particularly attractive characteristics.

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The Curious Case of Vanishing Lady Liberty; Only Gold and Silver Remember Her

The very first word anyone ever saw on a circulating United States coin was the word “LIBERTY.” From half-cents to silver dollars, each featured the likeness of an unnamed woman. The images varied, thanks to different engravers, but together they became recognized as Lady Liberty. Many, maybe most, of young America's citizens were illiterate. "Liberty" may have been the first word they ever learned to read.

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“It’s Prohibited By Law” – A Problem Emerges For Japan’s “Helicopter Money” Plans

2016-07-14

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2016-07-14

Over the past four days, risk assets have been on a tear, led by the collapsing Yen and soaring Nikkei, as the market has digested daily news that - as we predicted last week - Bernanke has been urging Japan to become the first developed country to unleash the monetary helicopter, in which the central banks directly funds government fiscal spending, most recently with an overnight report that Bernanke has pushed Abe and Kuroda to sell perpetual...

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Central Bank Wonderland is Complete and Now Open for Business — The Epocalypse Has Fully Begun

2016-07-14

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2016-07-14

Summer vacation is here, and the whole global family has arrived at Central-Bank Wonderland, the upside-down, inside-out world that banksters and their puppet politicians call “recovery.” Everyone is talking about it as wizened traders puzzle over how stocks and bonds soared, hand-in-hand, in face of the following list of economic thrills:

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Stockman Rages: Ben Bernanke Is “The Most Dangerous Man Walking This Planet”

2016-07-12

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2016-07-12

Ben Bernanke is one of the most dangerous men walking the planet. In this age of central bank domination of economic life he is surely the pied piper of monetary ruin. At least since 2002 he has been talking about “helicopter money” as if a notion which is pure economic quackery actually had some legitimate basis.

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