Tag Archive: inflation
Synchronizing Chinese Prices (and consequences)
It isn’t just the vast difference between Chinese consumer prices and those in the US or Europe, China’s CPI has been categorically distinct from China’s PPI, too. That distance hints at the real problem which the whole is just now beginning to confront, having been lulled into an inflationary illusion made up from all these things.
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Dollar and Yen Surge
Overview: Global equities are bleeding lower. Several large markets in the Asia Pacific region, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, and India are off more than 2%. Japan and Australian bourses fell by more than 1.5%.
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Greenback Softens Ahead of CPI
Overview: It appears that investors have become more concerned about growth prospects and less about inflation in recent days. The US 10-year yield that had flirted with 3.20% at the start of the week is now around 2.93%.
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Who’s Playing Puppetmaster, And Who Is Master of Puppets
Cue up the old VHS tapes of Bill Clinton. The former President was renowned for displaying, anyway, great empathy. He famously said in October 1992, weeks before the election that would bring him to the White House, “I feel your pain.”What pain? As Clinton’s chief political advisor later clarified, “it’s the economy stupid.”
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Some ‘Core’ ‘Inflation’ Difference(s)
The FOMC meets next week, with everyone everywhere expecting a 50 bps rate hike to be announced on Wednesday. Yesterday’s “unexpected” and “shocking” negative GDP is unlikely to deter anyone on the committee.
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Did China’s Politburo Throw Markets a Lifeline?
Overview: Speculation that a midday statement by China's Politburo signals new efforts to support the economy ahead of next week's holiday appears to have stirred the animal spirits.
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Not Good Goods
The goods economy in the United States is – maybe was – the lone economic bright spot. That in and of itself should’ve provoked more caution, instead there was the red-hot recovery to sell under the cover of supply shock pricing changes. The sheer spending on goods, and how they arrived, each unabashedly artificial from the get-go.
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China More and More Beyond ‘Inflation’
If only the rest of the world could have such problems. Chinese consumer prices were flat from February 2022 to March, even though gasoline and energy costs predictably skyrocketed. According to China’s NBS, gas was up 7.2% month-over-month while diesel costs on average gained 7.8%.
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Central Banks on a Preset Course Reduces Significance of High-Frequency Data
Arguably the most important data next week is the flash PMI. It is not available for all countries, but for those generally large G10 economies, the preliminary estimate is often sufficiently close to the final reading to steal its thunder.
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You Know What They Say About The Light At The End Of The Tunnel
In any year when gasoline prices rise 18%, that’s not going to be good for anyone except maybe oil companies who extract its key ingredient from out of the ground (or don’t, as the case can be). Yet, annual rates of increase that size do happen.
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Produzentenfenster Globale Rezessionsuhr
German optimism was predictably, inevitably sent crashing in March and April 2022. According to that country’s ZEW survey, an uptick in general optimism from November 2021 to February 2022 collided with the reality of Russian armored vehicles trying to snake their way down to Kiev. Whereas sentiment had rebounded from an October low of 22.3, blamed on whichever of the coronas, by February the index had moved upward to 54.3.
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New Day, Same as the Old Day
Overview: It is a new day, but with the continued rise in interest rates and weaker equities, it feels like yesterday. Only China and Hong Kong among the major markets in Asia Pacific resisted the pull lower. Europe's Stoxx 600 is off by more than 0.5% led by health care and real estate. It is the fourth loss in five sessions and brings the benchmark to its lowest level since March 18. US futures are flattish.
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Russia’s “gold peg”: Lessons for Western investors
It is undeniable that the ongoing crisis in Ukraine has polarized Western societies to an extent unseen in decades in any other foreign conflict. For over a month, we have been bombarded unceasingly by all mainstream media sources with reports and stories about Russia’s invasion and this conflict has already created deep social rifts in many other nations, and EU members in particular.
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Concocting Inventory
The Census Bureau provided some updated inventory estimates about wholesalers, including its annual benchmark revisions. As to the latter, not a whole lot was changed, a small downward revision right around the peak (early 2021) of the supply shock which is consistent with the GDP estimates for when inventory levels were shrinking fast.
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Equities Finding a Bid in Europe After Sliding in Asia Pacific
Overview: The capital markets are calmer today. The market is digesting the FOMC minutes, where officials tipped an aggressive path to shrink the balance sheet and confirmed an "expeditious" campaign to lift the Fed funds rate to neutrality. Benchmark 10-year yields are softer, with the US off a couple basis points to 2.58%. European yields are 1-3 bp lower.
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The Short, Sweet Income Case For Ugly Inversion(s), Too
A nod to just how backward and upside down the world is now. The economic data everyone is made to pay attention to, payrolls, that one is, in my view, irrelevant. As is the consumer price estimates from earlier this week, the PCE Deflator. That’s another one which receives vast amounts of interest even though it is already old news.
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Expect the Unexpected from the Fed
2022-04-28
by Stephen Flood
2022-04-28
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