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The Federal Reserve has targeted a 2% inflation rate for years, as though it’s a holy grail. As though 2% inflation was an economic panacea that would perfectly balance employment, business investment and bank lending.

Recently, the Fed has loosened the reins on inflation and let it charge ahead. Quite a bit – two consecutive months over 5%, two and a half times their self-imposed target.

For many, the big question is whether this is (to use Chairman Powell’s much-maligned phrase) “merely transitory,” a “blip” caused by supply-chain disruptions and post-pandemic recovery that’ll work itself out soon…

Or whether this is more akin to Carter-era inflation. The kind that shows up unannounced like college acquaintance, invites itself in and makes itself at home on your sofa. Finds the remote, turns on a game, and settles in for the long haul.

There’s no crystal ball. Instead, we have the bond market (it’s the next-best thing), which has consistently predicted long-term inflation rates of 2% or less for the last 20 months.

Is this proxy for a crystal ball cracked? Possibly. Many analysts point to the Federal Reserve’s insatiable demand for Treasury bonds, claiming that distorts the bond market and its signals beyond human interpretation.

Some voices have given up on condemning inflation, and instead have chosen to welcome it.

Inflation raises worker pay!

Here’s a rather hilarious “explainer” on the economic benefits of inflation. The best part:

Rising prices make it easier for companies to put up wages. They also give employers the flexibility not to increase wages by as much as inflation, but still offer their staff some sort of raise. In a world of zero inflation some companies might be forced to cut wages.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Look Back at Nixon’s Infamous Monetary Decision

August 12, 2021

A Look Back at Nixon’s Infamous Monetary Decision

A half century ago one of the most disastrous monetary decisions in U.S. history was committed by Richard Nixon. In a television address, the president declared that the nation would no longer redeem internationally dollars for gold. Since the dollar was the world’s reserve currency, Nixon’s closing of the “Gold Window” put the world on an irredeemable paper monetary standard.

The ramifications of the act continue to this very day. America’s current financial mess, budget deficits, the reoccurring booms and busts, the decline of living standards (particularly the middle class), all have their genesis with Nixon’s infamous decision in August, 1971.

Abandoning the last vestiges of the gold standard was the culmination of a long-term goal of the banksters, politicians, financial elites, and deceitful economists. The first step was the establishment of the Federal Reserve in 1913 whose primary purpose was to allow its member banks to inflate the money supply without fearing the consequences – bank failures/panics, bank runs, recessions/depressions. The Fed could, and still does, through the control of the money supply enrich itself, the government, and its aligned financial elites at the expense of the public at large.

The next step on the road to monetary debasement was Franklin Roosevelt’s draconian measure of outlawing the private ownership of gold. This was not only an unprecedented and outrageous attack on private property, but it also eliminated gold redemption of dollars domestically, which gave the Fed unlimited power to print money without fear of its notes being redeemed.

The specious justification for the law, enacted shortly after the start of FDR’s first tyrannical term in office, was to fight the Great Depression. Of course, the measure did nothing to mitigate the Depression which, in fact, was not caused by Americans’ ownership of gold, but rather the Fed itself and its wild inflationary policies throughout the “Roaring 20s.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Debt Ceiling Drama, Yellen Begins “Extraordinary Measures” to Stave Off Default

August 7, 2021

Debt Ceiling Drama, Yellen Begins “Extraordinary Measures” to Stave Off Default

Photo by Senator Mark Warner CC BY 2.0

Two years ago, the debt ceiling was lifted. Lifting the debt ceiling to make room for more government spending has been pretty routine since since 1917.

Until now…

While it’s quite likely that U.S. debt had already reached the point of no return around three years ago, amazingly the situation might have just gotten even worse. Why?

The debt ceiling extension that was granted back in 2019 has expired. Oops.

Janet Yellen is taking what are called “extraordinary measures” that hopefully will keep the U.S. economy from spiraling into a historic disaster of defaults on bond payments and government obligations, skyrocketing interest rates, and massive inflation.

The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) predicts the Treasury will run out of cash in October or possibly November.

So as reported above, the U.S. risks default within 90 days if nothing is done.

Yellen wrote a strongly-worded letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, describing the potential for “irreparable harm” if no action is taken.

But it might already be too late…

A closer look at the official U.S. debt reveals an unbelievable increase over the last 20 years:

Data from St. Louis Fed

That’s a 4.6x rise in “public debt,” meaning money the U.S. government owes. It’s called “public” debt because all of America shares the responsibility for paying it back. It’s public debt because the public, you and me, are on the hook for it.

Amazing, isn’t it?

Even so, this isn’t the first time “extraordinary measures” have kept the government spending machine humming along in response to debt-ceiling politics. But this could be the first time the clock will run out before a solution is reached.

Surprisingly — or perhaps not — the White House appears to be simply avoiding the current problem.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Peter Schiff: Central Banks Have Created the Mother of All Bubbles

August 6, 2021

Peter Schiff: Central Banks Have Created the Mother of All Bubbles

The Federal Reserve and other central banks around the world have pumped trillions of dollars into the global economy and depressed interest rates to artificially low levels to blow up the mother of all bubbles. In his podcast, Peter Schiff explained how the recent acquisition of Afterpay by Square reveals the extent of this global bubble economy that will inevitably have to pop.

Square paid $29 billion in an all-stock deal to purchase payment processor Afterpay. It was the biggest corporate takeover in Australian history.

Shares of Square rose 10% on the deal. As Peter noted, this isn’t typical. Normally, when a company buys another company at a premium and issues a bunch of stock, the acquiring company’s stock price drops.

But not in today’s crazy bubble world. In this bizarro world, the acquiring company goes up.”

Peter said Square overpaid for a company that he doesn’t think has much value whatsoever.

Afterpay is touted as an alternative to a credit card. When you buy something using Afterpay at a participating retailer, you only have to pay 25% at the point of sale. You then make three more payments to Afterpay over a six-week time period. In effect, the consumer gets a six-week interest-free loan.

Afterpay has been viewed as a big competitor for traditional credit card companies, but Peter pointed out this really isn’t the case.

Everybody, or most of the people, who are using Afterpay, are using their credit cards to pay Afterpay. All Afterpay is is another middleman that is getting in the way between the transaction.”

Afterpay generates revenue by charging merchants between 4 and 6% for every sale. Visa and Mastercard typically charge about 2%.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Behind the Curtain

August 3, 2021

Behind the Curtain

Jennifer Accuri, who had a love affair with Boris Johnson and obviously knows him very well, has also been out talking about what is going on behind the curtain. I have heard that this drive for 100% vaccination has at its core the attempt to whip society into obedient drones. That is the real goal. Whether these vaccines will result in massive deaths in 1 to 2 years as some are claiming, is questionable. I do not believe that is the goal, but that could be an unintended side-effect. I tend to suspect more of impacting fertility. However, I also know that there have been weaponizing viruses behind closed doors to target specific genetic makeup. I am NOT saying that has taken place. I am pointing out that they do have the technology to target specific genes and could have introduced something like that which is impacting some people and not others. Nobody will do a study on the vaccinated who are dying and do a correlation so we know if you have x, y, or z, do not get vaccinated.

They are altering the economy for the Great Reset BECAUSE the system is failing. They lowered interest rates to negative and destroyed their bond market. I do know that there were meeting with central banks before these lockdowns. That was not just in the UK, but also in Europe. There was not such a meet with the Fed on the part of Trump. But the Fed is well aware of what other central banks are doing and this is why the REPO crisis began with the capital flows shifting in August 2019 that our computer picked up and I reported at the WEC that year.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Tough Questions Generate Weak Common Assumptions

August 1, 2021

Tough Questions Generate Weak Common Assumptions

Picture Of Space Tourists

An article suggesting how common space travel is about to become highlights how willing people are to accept opinions as fact. Most people make assumptions based on a number of factors. These include what they see, what they hear, and more importantly, based on the general direction that things have been going. This means we as a population have developed “kind of a feeling” about what the future is likely to hold. Sadly, the way people form assumptions is heavily swayed by mainstream media and big tech’s hold over how we get information. We live in a world where reason and critical, independent thinking is in very short supply. This has created a situation where, we may someday find that we as a society, have been a bit overly optimistic about our potential. Black swan events do occur and when they do they can be game-changers. The world and life as a whole is full of risk. With this in mind I write this article to address a few questions that have been bothering me and a few other people that make a concerted effort to see past the hype, propaganda, and bull shit we are constantly fed by those with an agenda.

Frontline, on PBS, recently ran a program titled, Power Of The Fed. It reiterates how when COVID-19 struck, the Federal Reserve rapidly stepped in to avert an economic crisis. It looks at how as America’s central bank continues to pump billions of dollars into the financial system daily, who is benefiting, who is not, and whether their policy is working. The question is also raised as to what happens if they try to turn off the flow of easy money

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Lacy Hunt On Debt and Friedman’s Famous Quote Regarding Inflation and Money

July 23, 2021

Lacy Hunt On Debt and Friedman’s Famous Quote Regarding Inflation and Money

Lacy Hunt takes on the widespread belief that sustained inflation is on the way in his latest quarterly review.

Money Velocity and the Commercial Bank LD Ratio

Hoisington Quarterly Review and Outlook 2nd Quarter 2021

Here are some snips to the latest at Hoisington Management Quarterly Review (Emphasis Mine).

Too Much Debt

In highly indebted economies, additional debt triggers the law of diminishing returns. This fact is confirmed when the marginal revenue product of debt (MRP) falls, where MRP is the amount of GDP created by an additional dollar of debt. In microeconomics, when debt is already at extreme levels, a further increase in debt leads to an increase in the risk premium on which a borrower will default suggesting that the bank or other lender will not be repaid.

Combining both the falling MRP with a declining loan to deposit (LD) ratio, results in a reduction in the velocity of money. In terms of the impact on monetary activities, a drop in the LD ratio means that more of bank deposits are being directed to the purchase of Federal, Agency and state and local securities in lieu of private sector loans. The macroeconomic result is that funds are shifted to sectors that are the least productive engines of economic growth and away from the high multiplier ones.

More than thirty years ago, Stanford Ph.D. Rod McKnew demonstrated that the money multiplier, referred to as “m”, is higher for bank loans than bank investments in securities. The money multiplier, which is money stock (M2) divided by the monetary base should not be confused with the velocity of money. The latest trends strongly support McKnew’s analysis.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Too Much Money Chasing Too Few Goods and Services

July 19, 2021

Too Much Money Chasing Too Few Goods and Services

Inflation can be considered a tax, an especially regressive one, falling harder on those with lower income and/or assets.

As we’ve noted previously, the Federal Reserve’s “M2” monetary aggregate began growing significantly faster than the “GDP” measure of economic output in the United States beginning around 2008, amidst the 2007-2009 financial and economic crisis.

With the federal government’s massive fiscal and economic “stimulus” policies arriving together with a pandemic and government lockdowns, M2 growth has recently risen dramatically higher than GDP growth.

Earlier this week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (within the U.S. Department of Labor) reported that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose in June at one of its fastest growing rates in more than a decade. Some people have been pointing to the fact that year-over-year changes in the CPI may be high recently in part because the comparisons to last year’s levels were amidst the onset of the pandemic. But in the second quarter of 2021, compared to the first quarter of 2021 and on a seasonally adjusted basis, the CPI rose at an annualized rate of more than 8 percent, which is the highest quarterly growth rate since the third quarter of 1981.

It’s always worthwhile to keep an eye on alternative inflation measures, given the estimation issues associated with government statistics, and considering the source of those statistics.

Along those lines, a recent survey of small businesses by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) returned a result for prices that hasn’t been reached since 1981.

And the prices component of the monthly Institute for Supply Management survey of business purchasing managers rose in June 2021 to its highest reading since July 1979.

Inflation can be considered as a tax, and an especially regressive one, falling harder on those with lower income and/or assets. Inflation can be considered one cost of government.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Ugly And Difficult Hunt For The True Economy

July 17, 2021

The Ugly And Difficult Hunt For The True Economy

Good luck with acquiring a clear view of our economic future. It is shrouded and cloaked under an ocean of often irrelevant facts and figures. Somewhere between what we are told is occurring in the economy and what we see happening on Main Streets across America is the real and true authentic economy. It is ironic that every sign the economy is not getting better only reinforces the idea that the Fed needs to goose things and pour even more fuel on the fire. This is exactly what many of us oppose and consider pure insanity.

A false economy of fraud is created by seizing on a few positive numbers that can be spun and hyped to convince people all is well. Even as I’m writing this, a MarketWatch article just came out saying the U.S. stock-index futures were trading higher after a report on June retail sales came in stronger than expected. To that, I say, what do you expect, people are busy spending what they see as “free money.” Sadly, people buying goods made in China from Amazon does little to enrich our communities or the American economy.

The justification for continued Fed intervention is often attributed to the idea inflation is not a threat and further action poses little risk. Those behind increased and continued easing say more action is needed or a loop will develop that feeds on itself and ends in a deflationary depression.

Most of us are familiar with former President Bill Clinton’s infamous line; “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Grocery Stores Are Masking Price Hikes Via “Shrinkflation”

July 8, 2021

Grocery Stores Are Masking Price Hikes Via “Shrinkflation”

The continued decline in Treasury yields has prompted many short-sighted arm-chair analysts to declare that the Fed was right about inflationary pressures being “transitory”. Of course, as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen herself admitted, a little inflation is necessary for the economy to function long term – because without “controlled inflation,” how else will policymakers inflate away the enormous debts of the US and other governments.

As policymakers prepare to explain to the investing public why inflation is a “good thing”, a report published this week by left-leaning NPR highlighted a phenomenon that is manifesting in grocery stores and other retailers across the US: economists including Pippa Malmgren call it “shrinkflation”. It happens when companies reduce the size or quantity of their products while charging the same price, or even more money.

As NPR points out, the preponderance of “shrinkflation” creates a problem for academics and purveyors of classical economic theory. “If consumers were the rational creatures depicted in classic economic theory, they would notice shrinkflation. They would keep their eyes on the price per Cocoa Puff and not fall for gimmicks in how companies package those Cocoa Puffs.”

However, research by behavioral economists has found that consumers are “much more gullible than classic theory predicts. They are more sensitive to changes in price than to changes in quantity.” It’s one of many well-documented ways that human reasoning differs from strict rationality (for a more comprehensive review of the limitations of human reasoning in the loosely defined world of behavioral economics, read Daniel Kahneman’s “Thinking Fast and Slow”).

Just a few months ago, we described shrinkflation as “the oldest trick in the retailer’s book” with an explanation of how Costco was masking a 14% price hike by instead reducing the sheet count in its rolls of paper towels and toilet paper.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Wells Unexpectedly Shuts All Existing Personal Lines Of Credit, Hinting US Economy On The Edge

July 8, 2021

Wells Unexpectedly Shuts All Existing Personal Lines Of Credit, Hinting US Economy On The Edge

Wells Fargo just announced that it’s shutting down all of its existing personal lines of credit – a popular product offered by the retail-focused Wall Street giant – a move that will likely infuriate legions of customers.

The revolving credit lines, which will be shut down in the coming weeks, typically allow users borrow $3K to $100K, were pitched as a way to consolidate higher-interest credit-card debt, pay for home renovations or avoid overdraft fees on checking accounts attached to the loan.

Customers have been given a 60-day notice that their accounts will be shuttered, and remaining balances will require regular minimum payments, according to the statement.

According to CNBC, it’s the latest “difficult decision” facing Wells CEO Charlie Scharf, who is being forced to make cutbacks to the banks’ business thanks to restrictions imposed by the Federal Reserve years ago as punishment for the bank’s criminal scandals like the now-infamous scandal whereby branch managers opened credit lines for customers without permission. a scandal that outraged the public.

“Wells Fargo recently reviewed its product offerings and decided to discontinue offering new Personal and Portfolio line of credit accounts and close all existing accounts,” the bank said in the six-page letter. The move would let the bank focus on credit cards and personal loans, it said.

The sudden closures will leave many customers without what may be a critical source of liquidity. What’s worse, many will be penalized for the decision, making it more difficult for them to receive credit from a new source. Per CNBC, those whose credit lines are involuntarily closed will still see their FICO scores penalized as if they had elected to close the credit line willingly.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

While Fed Is in Denial, Hawkish Bank of Russia Sees Inflation as “Not Transitory,” Warns of Possible Shock-and-Awe Rate Hike

July 5, 2021

While Fed Is in Denial, Hawkish Bank of Russia Sees Inflation as “Not Transitory,” Warns of Possible Shock-and-Awe Rate Hike

US Inflation is almost as hot as in Russia, but the Fed is still blowing it off.

Consumer price inflation in Russia is red-hot, having jumped 6.0% in May compared to a year ago, 2 percentage points above the Bank of Russia’s target of 4.0%. Polls in Russia show that food inflation is a top concern, currently running at 7.4%.

But inflation in the US isn’t lagging far behind: The Consumer Price Index (CPI) jumped 5.0% in May. Yet the central banks are on opposite tracks in their approach to inflation.

Federal Reserve governors keep jabbering about this red-hot inflation being “temporary” or “transitory,” and likely to disappear on its own despite huge government stimulus and the Fed’s huge and ongoing monetary stimulus, though some doubts are creeping in among a couple of them. So they’ll keep interest rates at near-zero until at least next year, and they’re still buying $120 billion a month in securities to push down long-term interest rates.

Russia has been on the opposite trajectory, “surprising” economists at every step along the way. This trajectory started on March 19 with a 25 basis point rate hike, to 4.5%, against the expectations of 27 of the 28 economists polled by Reuters, who didn’t expect a rate hike. On April 23, the Bank of Russia hiked its policy rate by 50 basis points, to 5.0%. On June 11, it hiked by another 50 basis points to 5.5%. The next policy meeting is scheduled for July 23.

Is a shock-and-awe rate hike next? Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Nabiullina is preparing the markets for this possibility – so it won’t be a shock, but just awe.

At the July meeting, the central bank “will consider” an increase in the range from “25 basis points to 1 percentage point,” she told Bloomberg TV in an interview.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Cornered Fed Weighs Dilemma: Market Crash or Runaway Inflation?

July 3, 2021

Cornered Fed Weighs Dilemma: Market Crash or Runaway Inflation?

Image via Science Photo Library

The U.S. economy is at a fork in the road.

One route leads to the return of market fundamentals and sane stock valuations, at the cost of a historic market correction.

The other route leads to runaway hyperinflation that eats up the debt almost as fast as it devours the dollar’s buying power. That would likely cause the dollar to lose its hegemony as global reserve currency and bring about a simultaneous market collapse.

Here’s where we are, and where we might be going…

How did we get here?

For the most part, through Fed interventions that suppressed interest rates for the last 13 years, creating artificial demand for U.S. IOUs in the form of bonds, and generally maintaining an “easy money” policy. (And let’s not forget the hundreds of millions of stimulus checks, unemployment extensions, fraud-riddled Payroll Protection Program and the other boondoggles associated with the pandemic lockdown.)

Now, all this works great. For a while. The Fed came out of the Great Recession with $2 trillion on its balance sheet. Today, over a decade later, its balance sheet sits at $8 trillion. And climbing.

Let’s reiterate: This works great. For a while.

Junk-rated companies are able to borrow massive amounts of money (and spend it all on bitcoin, sure, why not?) at absurdly low rates, only 3% over the “safe rate” offered by Treasurys. Everyone who owns stocks made money, at least on paper. We’ve already watched stock valuations climb into the stratosphere as lockdown-addled day-traders took their stimmies to the Robinhood casino to play with the /WallStreetBets and AMC apes. We’ve seen home values skyrocket (15% annually in April 2021 and currently about 30% higher than the peak of the housing bubble).

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

When Expedient “Saves” Become Permanent, Ruin Is Assured

June 28, 2021

When Expedient “Saves” Become Permanent, Ruin Is Assured

The Fed’s “choice” is as illusory as the “wealth” the Fed has created with its perfection of moral hazard.

The belief that the Federal Reserve possesses god-like powers and wisdom would be comical if it wasn’t so deeply tragic, for the Fed doesn’t even have a plan, much less wisdom. All the Fed has is an incoherent jumble of expedient, panic-driven “saves” it cobbled together in the 2008-2009 Global Financial Meltdown that it had made inevitable.

The irony is the only thing that will still be rich when the whole rotten, corrupt, fragile financial system of illusory stability collapses in a heap of runaway instability. The irony is that the Fed’s leaky grab-bag of expedient “saves” was not designed to ensure systemic stability, though that was the PR cover story.

The Fed’s leaky grab-bag of expedient “saves” had only one purpose: save the fat-cats, skimmers, scammers, fraudsters and embezzlers who had gotten rich off the Fed’s cloaked transfer of wealth: the purpose of all the 2008-2009 extremes was not to impose the discipline required to truly stabilize the financial system; the purpose was to elevate moral hazard— the separation of risk from the consequences of risk–to unprecedented heights, backstopping every skimmer, scammer, fraudster and embezzler from well-deserved losses as the entire pyramid of fraud collapsed under its own enormous weight of risky bets gone bad.

To save its cronies from the catastrophic losses that should have been taken by those making the bets, the Fed instituted one expedient “save” after another: backstopped global banks with $16 trillion, dropped interest rates to zero, eliminated truthful reporting by ending mark-to-market pricing of risk, flooded the financial system with free money for financiers, all designed to signal that the Fed will never let its cronies suffer the consequences of their risky bets, i.e. the perfection of moral hazard.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Peter Schiff: Political Hypocrisy Provides Cover for Fed on Inflation

June 28, 2021

Peter Schiff: Political Hypocrisy Provides Cover for Fed on Inflation

From 2016 to 2020, Republicans were constantly trying to play up the economy. You’ll recall Donald Trump claiming it was the greatest economy in history. Meanwhile, Democrats were trying to play it down. Now, the roles have reversed. Since the Democrats own the economy now, they’re talking about how great the recovery is while Republicans are sounding warnings. As Peter Schiff explained in his podcast, this political hypocrisy is letting the real culprit get away without blame.

We saw this political hypocrisy on display during Jerome Powell’s recent testimony before the House Select Committee on COVID-19. The Democrats on the committee took the opportunity to grandstand about how great the economy is doing. As Peter put it, “They own the economy and they want to pretend that everything is great.” Their questions and statements focused on what a good job Powell is doing.

It’s interesting in that the Democrats are the ones that are trying to play down the inflation fears. They’re the ones that are trying to agree with Powell and reiterate the fact that everything is transitory and so we’ve got nothing to worry about.”

The Democrats don’t want to admit there is an inflation problem because that would be a blemish on this otherwise wonderful economy.

Meanwhile, the Republicans are pushing Powell on inflation and talking about it as a tax. But they’re not blaming Powell or the Fed. They’re placing the blame on Biden and the Democrats’ spending.

They’re not even really trying to blame the Fed for all the money printing. They’re just blaming Biden for all the money spending. But of course, Biden couldn’t be spending any money if the Fed wasn’t printing it…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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