And if America can’t find anyone willing to finance its deficits, what then? Well, the luxury of issuing debts in the currency you also print is that you can print money to pay for them. Technically, you can never become insolvent when you enjoy this privilege. The Fed, for example, can create new money to buy debt issued by the Treasury, funding deficits ad infinitum.
November 3rd, 2009 | Dan Denning | 5 comments | ContinuedAll Posts Tagged With: "interest rates"
IMF Report Concludes Aussie Banks are “Very Sound”…
The Guv also said he would not be too timid about raising interest rates. He believes the threat [of global financial calamity] has passed and that the bigger threat may well be inflation. That kind of tough talk sent the Aussie dollar right up to over 92 cents against the greenback. If it weren’t late fall, now might be the perfect time to take a trip to America and see how cheap things really are.
October 16th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 13 comments | Continued
Can Governments and Central Banks Prevent More Credit Writedowns?
Are we changing our tune, then, about what to expect from markets? Not one bit. But the question now is timing. The collapse of 2008 was so severe because of the sudden reduction in leverage in the financial sector. As assets fell in value, the most highly leveraged firms (or lenders who raised money by selling debt) went out of business.
October 12th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 34 comments | Continued
Will Gold Make Higher Highs From Here?
What’s more, the emergence of the gold exchange traded funds (ETFs) has put a huge portion of the gold market in a very small number of hands. If the ETFs sell…who will they sell to? Or more succinctly, a lot of the gold demand is coming from a few institutions. If other institutions (central banks and sovereign wealth funds) don’t pick up the slack, there will be more sellers than buyers and prices will fall.
October 7th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 3 comments | Continued
Big Difference Between Stark News in Job Market and Behaviour of Stock Market
There have been jobless recoveries from recession before. But you still have to wonder how there can be such a big difference between the stark news in the job market and the behaviour of the stock market. True, economists will tell you that jobs are the last thing to recover from a recession. Businesses don’t hire until they are sure everything is in the clear.
October 5th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 4 comments | Continued
The Dead Weight Cost of the Stimulus
On 21 September I provided testimony to the Senate Economics References Committee on the damage done by the government’s “stimulus” package. The submission was broken into five separate sections.
October 2nd, 2009 | Dr. Steven Kates | 35 comments | Continued
Japanese Practically Gave Away Money to Anyone Who Would Borrow It
We wrote a book, Financial Reckoning Day with Addison Wiggin, in 2003. In it, we predicted that the United States would follow Japan into a long slump. We thought it would begin after the tech crash of 2000…
September 16th, 2009 | Bill Bonner | 1 comment | Continued
Why Do Men and Women Want Money and Power?
At least as practiced by the leading macroeconomists of our time – such as Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner and Larry Summers. It’s just a show-off sport…the idea is to impress the world with some fancy data-heavy formula…win the Nobel Prize and save the world.
September 9th, 2009 | Bill Bonner | 0 comments | Continued
Financial World Has Every Reason to Encourage Government Stimulus
Besides, the limits on executive compensation are window-dressing for public (voter) consumption. With bonuses limited by statute, we reckon more compensation for the financial industry will move back to stock option grants. That means for the financial industry to preserve its privileged status, stock prices have to move higher.
September 8th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 6 comments | Continued
China Was the Maker and the United States Was the Taker
When we were growing up, China was a ‘Red Menace.’ It was full of mad people doing mad things. They humiliated people by making them wear dunce hats and march through town. The Chinese made steel in backyard barbecues.
August 20th, 2009 | Bill Bonner | 0 comments | Continued
It Would Take About 19 Years to Erase Debt From Bubble Period
Now, along comes the Comstock crowd with roughly the same guess – two decades. They figure that the savings rate will go up to 10% and that the effect of taking that money out of the consumer economy will be to put the United States into a long, soft slump…
August 12th, 2009 | Bill Bonner | 0 comments | Continued
This Reflation is Not Yet a Monster Hyper-inflation
The market begins the month of August trying to prove that the Great Recession is over and the earnings recovery has begun. On Friday, US GDP data came out and seemed to confirm that just maybe the worst is behind us. According to the cryptic figures, US GDP is shrinking at annualised pace of just 1% – considerably less than the 6.4% from late last year.
August 3rd, 2009 | Dan Denning | 0 comments | Continued
Meredith Whitney and the Buy Recommendation on Goldman Sachs
Hold that thought. Her recommendation preceded Goldman’s actual announcement on Tuesday that second quarter net earnings were up 65% to $3.44 billion. The company, like Wall Street’s very own chosen-one-boy-wizard, has once again waved its magic wand and produced something remarkable. So let’s remark on it…
July 15th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 3 comments | Continued
Warren Buffett Says American Economy is a Shambles
Yesterday didn’t turn out so bad after all on the ASX. Stocks finished slightly up, as did the Aussie dollar and oil. Today might be a different story, though. For starters, billionaire investor/guru/jovial-grandfatherly-figure Warren Buffett has said the American economy is a “shambles.” Buffett told CNBC that the worst of the financial crisis peaked late last year (we’re not so sure). But the economic crisis? That’s still in full flight…
June 25th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 3 comments | Continued
Attack of the Bond Yields
Just to be clear though, the big trends now are soaring inflation and falling financial asset prices, along with increased energy scarcity. This produces a variety of pair trades, which include: short government bonds, long energy, short residential housing, long gold, and probably short commercial real estate and corporate bonds as well, while going long farmland and agriculture.
June 11th, 2009 | Dan Denning | 4 comments | Continued
