I missed it: did anyone ask Chairman Jay Powell how in the world he’s going to be able to create this “hot” inflation he already needs to balance out a decade without it (meaning: recovery and growth) in order to satisfy this newfangled average inflation target? And though he makes it sound like it’s a […]
Survivor’s euphoria, but then what? Reopening momentum, though would that be enough on its own? More of a concern, the uptrend was heavily infused by government intervention. How much was organic, how much wastefully artificial (in the sense of “stimulus”; as economic aid, it was necessary)? So many questions, so much to try and sort […]
With all these warning signs pointing squarely back to the middle or end of July, it’s pretty clear that “something” changed the momentum maybe even direction of the economy’s reopening rebound. There’s also no question about what one key part of what might have been responsible, thus the quotation marks surrounding the word “something.”The federal […]
For a couple of years there, the oil patch was the heaviest contributor to the idea, at least, that the US economy had been booming. It never really boomed, of course, but on the industrial side investment and production throughout offshore and shale really were boosted and all predicated on the idea that Jay Powell’s […]
One day short of one year ago, on September 16, 2019, China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reported its updated monthly estimates for the Big 3 accounts. Industrial Production (IP) is a closely-watched indicator as it is relatively decent proxy for the entire goods economy around the world. Retail Sales in the post-Euro$ #2 context […]
There is no oil in the CPI’s consumer basket, yet oil prices largely determine the rate by which overall consumer prices are increasing (or not). WTI sets the baseline which then becomes the price of motor fuel (gasoline) becoming the energy segment. As energy goes, so do headline CPI measurements. And that’s a huge problem…if […]
Does anyone remember “transitory?” I know I do. I spent years ridiculing the idea. But after 2019’s interest rate debacle, cuts rather than hikes, the Federal Reserve very quietly banished that particular word. This was, of course, during the course of the central bank’s “exhaustive” study surrounding its major inflation puzzle. “Transitory” had been the […]
Though there’s not much to add, it’s worth bringing this up again. In the era of gigantic positives, why aren’t sentiment surveys so much more positive than they are? It’s because these PMI numbers aren’t what you’re being told they are. After such a huge contraction, mid-50’s is a bomb; mid-50’s (the best ones) in […]
Where would humankind be if Enlightenment scholars had instead decided that each time they failed to validate an important hypothesis, the answer to said failure and the means to achieve progress was only in clinging to the same theory but restating it with even more conviction and greater emphasis?
Why the big deal about the Fed’s new grand strategy? For one thing, as noted yesterday, there’s that whole lost decade which policymakers finally have acknowledged. They’ve quite a lot of catching up to do, but have waited for the most inopportune moment to…basically do more of the same things that hadn’t accomplished anything other […]