For us the Net National Savings Rate is the best alternative indictator to GDP growth. It is positively correlated with the change in wealth, with the establishment of future productive capacity, the price of government bonds and currency valuations. But today GDP growth is often negatively correlated to the Net Savings Rate. Hence GDP is often a less useful measure.
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Tag Archive: Valuation Effect
Household Savings Rate Compared
GDP growth is a bad economic measure. GDP growth in the form of consumption-driven (hyper-) activity (aka Bawerk's "GDC" Gross Domestic Consumption) must finally lead to a depreciating currency, inflation, falling government bond prices and wealth in real terms. Instead, GDP should be driven by investment and the consequent improvements in productivity.
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Brexit: BoE Governor Not Optimistic
Stateside, this is a holiday shortened trading week, one that will be dominated by two fundamental events - Wednesday's FOMC minutes and Friday's non-farm payroll (NFP) report for June. With no surprises expected in the minutes, both dealers and investors have very much priced out any possibility of a U.S rate hike occurring within the next 18-months. In respect to the jobs report, is it possible that the U.S can print two disappointing numbers...
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Swiss Reserves: Not what They Seem
This posts shows again the stupidity of the financial media, that mixes up assets and liabilities for central banks.
SNB FX reserves are assets. They are in different foreign currencies and subject to the valuation effect of these currencies.
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Ex-Post FX Evaluation: Is the Swiss Capital Account Able to Neutralise the Persistent Current Account Surpluses?
(post written originally in March 2013)
We reckon that the Swiss National Bank (SNB) will have issues maintaining the EUR/CHF floor in the longer term, because the expected yields on Swiss investments abroad will not be sufficiently higher than the yield on investments in Switzerland. Because of this insufficient risk-reward relationship, outflows in the capital account of the Swiss balance of payments will not cover the persistent Swiss current...
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(9.1) Net International Investment Position
A comparison of the net international investment position (NIIP) of several countries. We explain why asset valuation effects this position at the example of the United States.
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2014 Results: SNB expects profit of CHF 38 billion
The Swiss National Bank reported a profit of CHF 38 billion for the year 2014. They obtained price gains in all asset classes, in bonds, stocks and gold. Interest payments and dividends achieved a yield of 1.7%.
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Comparing Trade Balances with FX Rates: Will the European Miracle End?
Eurostat recently published the European exports, imports and trade balance for the first ten months of 2012 compared to 2011. These show heavy improvements for the Southern member states but also a strong dependency on a weak euro.
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Written in February 2012: Will the EUR/CHF never rise over 1.22 or 1.23 again?
Our analysis from February 2012 shows astonishing accurateness: It predicted that the euro would not rise against CHF and that the commodity currencies were overvalued and subject to correction.
Basic foreign exchange theory, the SNB price stability mandate and strong fundamentals for Switzerland and bad ones for the peripheral countries of the euro zone speak for the thesis that the EUR/CHF exchange rate might never go over the level of around...
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