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The Futility of Central Bank Policy

It is only now becoming clear to the investing public that the purchasing power of their currencies is declining at an accelerating rate. There is no doubt that yesterday’s announcement that the US CPI rose by 6.2%, compared with the longstanding 2% target, came as a wake-up call to markets.

Along with the other major central banks, the Fed’s reaction is likely to be to double down on interest rate suppression to keep bond yields low and stock valuations intact. The alternative will lead to a major financial, economic and currency shock sooner rather than later.

This article introduces the reader to some of the basic fallacies behind state currencies. It explains the misconceptions policy planners have over interest rates, and how central banks have become contracyclical lenders, replacing commercial banking’s credit creation for non-financial activities.

In effect, narrow money is being used by the major central banks in a vain attempt to shore up government finances and economic activity. The consequences for currency debasement are likely to be more immediate and profound than cyclical bank credit expansion.

Introduction

It is becoming clear that there has been an unofficial agreement between the US Fed, Bank of England, the ECB and probably the Bank of Japan not to raise interest rates. It is confirmed by remarkably similar statements from the former three in recent days. When, as the cliché has it, they are all singing off the same hymn sheet, those of us not party to agreements between our monetary policy planners are right to suspect they are doubling down on a market rigging exercise encompassing all financial markets.

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

«The Fed Reminds Me of a Speculator Who Is on the Wrong Side of the Market»

Jim Grant, editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, warns of the rampant speculation in the stock market. He worries that the central banks are underestimating the threat of persistently high inflation and explains why gold has a bright future.

The financial markets are «high». In the U.S., the S&P 500 is up for seven straight days, closing on another record at the end of last week. Particularly in demand are red-hot stocks like Tesla and Nvidia with fantastically rich valuations. Together, the two companies have gained around $600 billion in market value in the past three weeks alone.

For Jim Grant, this is an environment that calls for increased caution. According to the editor of the iconic investment bulletin «Grant’s Interest Rate Observer», investors have to beware of an explosive cocktail combining exceptionally easy monetary policy, a pronounced appetite for speculation, and the high degree of leverage. He also thinks that central banks are underestimating the risk of persistent inflation.

«We have one of the most speculative Zeitgeists on record»: Jim Grant.

«We have one of the most speculative Zeitgeists on record»: Jim Grant.

(Photo: Bloomberg)

«The Fed reminds me of a speculator who is on the wrong side of the market», says Mr. Grant. The fact that the Federal Reserve is now beginning to taper its bond purchases makes little difference in his view. «It’s like pouring a little less gasoline on the fire,» he thinks.

In this in-depth interview with The Market/NZZ, which has been edited and condensed for clarity, the outspoken market observer and contrarian investor compares today’s environment with the second half of the 1960s and explains why he expects persistently high inflation rates. He explains what this means for the dollar as well as for gold, and where the best investment opportunities are with respect to the challenge of global warming.

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

Inflationary pressure in the US

We are seeing more news about rising inflation,  but in reality the US data isn’t as bad as the news coverage would lead us to believe.  The following table shows the data of seasonally adjusted price changes by month published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

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Food prices are continuing to rise at about the same rate each month with a total rise of 5% for the last 12 months.  Current shortages of fertilizer and the herbicide glyphosate (which we import from China) could result in additional price increases through next year.  Much of the increase in meat and processed food.  We can save money on our food budget buying in bulk, particularly dried beans and grains.  Learning to cook vegetarian and vegan meals can also save money on food bills.

Not surprisingly, the largest jump in October prices was energy, largely a reflection of the energy crisis in UK and China.  The crisis is spreading and we may yet see additional oil and gas prices rising this winter if temperatures are colder than normal.  US energy prices are far lower than what Europe and Asia currently face.  We should also remember that at the start of the pandemic shut down energy prices plummeted and much of the current increase is making up for it.

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

 

5 Ways Economy’s Worse Than You Think

5 Ways Economy’s Worse Than You Think

https://youtu.be/fpbORCUTMq4

Dollar Purchasing Power Plunges. Inflation +6.2%. For Urban Wage Earners +6.9%, Highest in 40 years, Most Monstrously Overstimulated Economy Ever.

Dollar Purchasing Power Plunges. Inflation +6.2%. For Urban Wage Earners +6.9%, Highest in 40 years, Most Monstrously Overstimulated Economy Ever.

Fed still printing money and repressing “real” interest rates to negative 6%, new vehicle prices spike by most since 1975, housing CPI jumps, food & energy soar.

The broadest Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) spiked 0.9% in October from September, and by 6.2% from a year ago, the highest since November 1990 (6.3%) and since 1982, according to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics today.

The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) spiked by 6.9% in October year-over-year, the highest since June 1982, nearly 40 years ago:

This CPI-W is the index upon which the Social Security COLAs are based, which are determined by the average during the third quarter. The Q3 average of 5.9% set the COLA for 2022 at 5.9%, the highest COLA since 1982, and there was some jubilation among beneficiaries a month ago. But now inflation is blowing right past that COLA.

As Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic pointed out, “transitory has become a dirty word.” This massive inflation occurred while the Fed still had its foot fully on the accelerator – $120 billion a month in money printing and near-0% short-term interest rates, meaning “real” short-term rates are at negative 6.0%.

The Fed has been saying over and over again ad nauseam for seven months that inflation will slow down somehow on its own, even as the Fed had the foot fully on the accelerator, and every step along the way, the Fed has grossly underestimated the surge of inflation, and continues to do so. The Powell Fed has unleashed a monster.

Here is Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s reaction to this inflation monster blowout, as captured by cartoonist Marco Ricolli for WOLF STREET:

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

Two Big Myths About Why Energy Prices Are Rising

Photo: Bridget Bennett/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The global economic recovery is running low on fuel. Chinese factories have been flickering on and off as Beijing rations electricity. Britons have been parking in petrol lines as their nation’s pumps run dry. Americans have turned on their president as spiking gas prices eat their wage gains. And the entire northern hemisphere is sweating the cost of keeping warm this winter.

High energy prices have long been the bane of the post-2020 recovery. But as the days grow shorter and the nights get colder, their salience is steadily rising. In recent days, Democrats and Republicans alike have called on Joe Biden to take immediate action to reduce the cost of energy. The former implored the president to bring down gas prices by tapping the nation’s emergency oil reserves. The latter chastised Biden for personally driving up energy prices by blocking new oil and gas drilling on federal land.

Meanwhile, fossil-fuel lobbyists and eco-socialists alike are casting the energy crunch as a byproduct of the world’s (slow and uneven) green transition. In their account, investors have been spurning new oil and gas production out of fear of future regulations, while renewables have failed to scale up fast enough to compensate. For oil barons, this narrative functions as an argument against stringent carbon pricing. For Marxists, it offers hope for an impending crisis of capitalism, as the old energy system dies and the new one struggles to be born.

Global energy markets contain multitudes. The price of oil internalizes myriad forces, from the financial to the macroeconomic to the geopolitical to the meteorological. So, one can tell a wide range of true stories about the energy crisis of 2021…

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

Biden Starts To Freak Out About Soaring Inflation, Orders Economic Council To “Reduce Energy Costs”

Biden Starts To Freak Out About Soaring Inflation, Orders Economic Council To “Reduce Energy Costs”

When discussing today’s “shock” CPI report we said that it was just a matter of time before there is a wave of political blowback that will make the recent anti-democrat revulsion in Virginia and NJ seem like amateur hour. Specifically, we said that “the explosive inflation surge threatens to exacerbate political challenges for President Brandon as he seeks to pass a nearly $2 trillion tax-and-spending package and defend razor-thin congressional majorities in next year’s midterm elections.”

And most importantly, wage increases are NOT keeping pace with the soaring cost of living (real waged growth is negative)…

It took just a few minutes for this prediction to materialize because just around the time the market opened, Biden addressed the public and confirmed that unlike the Fed, he is finally starting to freak out about soaring prices, to wit:

… on inflation, today’s report shows an increase over last month. Inflation hurts Americans pocketbooks, and reversing this trend is a top priority for me. The largest share of the increase in prices in this report is due to rising energy costs—and in the few days since the data for this report were collected, the price of natural gas has fallen.

I have directed my National Economic Council to pursue means to try to further reduce these costs, and have asked the Federal Trade Commission to strike back at any market manipulation or price gouging in this sector.

And just how does Biden plan on pulling this directive straight out of communist China? Will he restart the Keystone XL pipeline; or will the US fund shale producers – that could be awkward in light of Joe’s faux environment concerns. Then again, it’s just optics confirming that in a time of near-record inflation, at least Biden’s talk remains extremely cheap.

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

Relief from High Prices Unlikely, Analysts Say Ahead of Consumer Inflation Data Release

Relief from High Prices Unlikely, Analysts Say Ahead of Consumer Inflation Data Release

With investors closely eyeing two major data releases this week on inflation—one on producer input costs and the other on consumer prices—Wells Fargo analysts say it’s unlikely sticker-shock-weary consumers will see relief as the persistent supply-side crunch will “keep fanning the flames on inflation in the near term.”

On Tuesday, the Labor Department will release data for October’s producer price index (PPI), which tends to front-run consumer inflation data as at least some production costs get passed on to consumers. Economists expect a year-over-year rise of 8.7 percent in the PPI inflation measure, which would be the highest reading in the history of the series. Last month’s PPI came in at 8.6 percent, a record high.

And on Wednesday, the Labor Department will issue figures for October’s consumer price index (CPI), a key measure of inflation from the perspective of end consumers of goods and services. Consensus forecasts predict a year-over-rise of 5.3 percent in the CPI inflation gauge for October, with the prior month’s rise amounting to 5.4 percent, near a 30-year high.

On a month-over-month basis, CPI is expected to clock in at 0.5 percent, according to consensus forecasts released by FXStreet, though Wells Fargo analysts expect inflation was running hotter.

“Consumer Price Index report for the month of October is unlikely to offer much of a reprieve on the inflation front,” Wells Fargo analysts wrote in a note, in which they predict a 0.6 percent month-over-month increase in the CPI index. “If realized, this would put headline CPI inflation at 5.9 percent year-over-year.”

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

MSNBC Goes Full Clowntard: Gaslights That Inflation Is A “Good Thing”, Deletes Tweet After Angry Backlash

MSNBC Goes Full Clowntard: Gaslights That Inflation Is A “Good Thing”, Deletes Tweet After Angry Backlash

While millions of Americans are suffering from runaway, galloping inflation everywhere (to avoid the dreaded “H” word that made Jack Dorsey every lib’s enemy #1) from the gas pump to the grocery store aisle – which of course affects low-income individuals the most, MSNBC has gone up to bat for the Biden administration, deploying their best pretzel-logician to explain why all this inflation is literally – wait for it – good.

First, the now-deleted tweet…

Nevermind that in September, a Kroger executive warned in that grocery prices were about to get nasty, and the company will be “passing along higher cost to the customer where it makes sense to do so.” Or that Nestle CFO Francois-Xavier Roger said blistering inflation would likely continue into next year – telling the crowd at a Barclays consumer staples conference: “If we talk of 2022, it is likely that input cost inflation will be higher next year than this year.”

Or that Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic admitted last month that inflation is not transitory (and even has a swear jar collecting dollar bills for every time some gaslighter utters the word “transitory”).

Or that agricultural input costs from fertilizer to feed have gone through the roof – thanks to soaring natural gas prices of all things.

Or labor shortages throughout the supply chain – including US ports and the trucking industry – including those who refuse to take the Covid-19 vaccine.

Or just read this from Bank of America:

“Meanwhile on Main Street: cost of living rising…wages rising; food (coffee @ 7-year high, wheat @ 13-year high), energy (BofA forecast $120/bbl Brent next 6 months), shelter (US rents up 9% YoY), wages annualizing 6% past 6 months; US core CPI currently 4.0% YoY, likely to be 5-6% spring’22.”

Nope. You see, the inflation we’re seeing today is a good thing, according to MSNBC’s James Surowiecki, whose financial background is a Ph.D. in American history and being a writer at The Motley Fool and The New Yorker.

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

Janet Yellen Admits The “Net Zero” Grand Reset Price Tag Will Be $150 Trillion

Janet Yellen Admits The “Net Zero” Grand Reset Price Tag Will Be $150 Trillion

For years, the climate change lobby was laser-focused on just one aspect of the “climate change” crusade: the end – which supposedly is some world where the temperatures no longer rise due to fossil fuel emissions (because we now live in a world of global warming as scientists agree, not to be confused with the global cooling hypothesis that emerged in the 1970s, when many were even warning of a new ice age) justifying the means. Meanwhile the “means”, or the final cost to taxpayers of all that endless, tedious virtual signaling, was almost never touched upon for a reason – as we first explained three weeks ago, the bill for getting the world from point A to that mythical, utopic point B, was so high, it would be double global GDP.

For those who missed it, here is an excerpt of what we wrote back on October 14, shortly after Bank of America published the definitive compendium on climate change and the coming Net Zero (i.e., great reset) world, and which we discussed in depth:

“while it is handy to have a centralized compendium of the data, a 5 minute google search can provide all the answers that are “accepted” dogma by the green lobby. But while we don’t care about the charts, that cheat sheets, or the propaganda, what we were interested in was the bottom line – how much would this green utopia cost, because if the “net zero”, “ESG”, “green” narrative is pushed so hard 24/7, you know it will cost a lot.

Turns out it does. A lot, lot.

Responding rhetorically to the key question, “how much will it cost?”, BofA cuts to the chase and writes $150 trillion over 30 years – some $5 trillion in annual investments – amounting to twice current global GDP!

The Mainstream Has the Inflation Story Backwards

The Mainstream Has the Inflation Story Backwards

The mainstream blames inflation on “supply chain bottlenecks.” But they have it completely backward. In reality, Federal Reserve-created inflation is causing the supply chain mess.

According to Biden administration talking points, the economy is booming. Americans are flush with cash. And they are demanding lots of goods. The supply chain simply can’t keep up. That’s why we’re seeing empty shelves and rising prices. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg summed up the mainstream mantra.

 Demand is up … because income is up, because the president has successfully guided this economy out of the teeth of a terrifying recession.”

White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki told a similar tale. She said we have supply chain problems because “people have more money … their wages are up … we’ve seen an economic recovery that is underway.”

This sounds like a lot of spin. But in one sense, the mainstream is right. As Mises Institute Senior Editor Ryan McMaken pointed out in a recent article on the Mises Wire, they are correct when it comes to consumer demand and spending, even if they got it right for the wrong reason.

As Mihai Macovei showed earlier this month, the global volume of trade and shipping volume in 2021 have actually exceeded prepandemic numbers. For example, in the port of Los Angeles, ‘loaded imports’ and ‘total imports’ for the 2020–21 fiscal year (ending June 30, 2021) were both up when compared to the same period of the 2018–19 fiscal year. In other words, it’s not as if little is moving through these ports. In fact, more is moving through them than ever before. That suggests demand is indeed higher.”

But why is demand so much higher? As Psaki said, Americans have more money in their pockets. Wages are up nominally. But it’s not because the economy is booming. As McMaken points out, it’s due to inflation.

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

Waypoints on the road to currency destruction — and how to avoid it

Waypoints on the road to currency destruction — and how to avoid it

The few economists who recognise classical human subjectivity see the dangers of a looming currency collapse. It can easily be avoided by halting currency expansion and cutting government spending so that their budgets balance. No democratic government nor any of its agencies have the required mandate or conviction to act, so fiat currencies face ruin.

These are some waypoints to look for on the road to their destruction:

  • Monetary policy will be challenged by rising prices and stalling economies. Central banks will almost certainly err towards accelerating inflationism in a bid to support economic growth.
  • The inevitability of rising bond yields and falling equity markets that follows can only be alleviated by increasing QE, not tapering it. Look for official support for financial markets by increased QE.
  • Central banks will then have to choose between crashing their economies and protecting their currencies or letting their currencies slide. The currency is likely to be deemed less important, until it is too late.
  • Realising that it is currency going down rather than prices rising, the public reject the currency entirely and it rapidly becomes valueless. Once the process starts there is no hope for the currency.

But before we consider these events, we must address the broader point about what the alternative safety to a fiat collapse is to be: cryptocurrencies led by bitcoin, or metallic money to which people have always returned when state fiat money has failed in the past.
Introduction

When expected events begin to unfold, they can be marked by waypoints. These include predictable government responses, and the confused statements of analysts who are unfamiliar with the circumstances. We see this today in the early stages of an inflation that threatens to become a terminal cancer for fiat currencies.
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There’s No ‘Supply-Chain Shortage,’ Or Inflation. There’s Just Central Planning

It’s great that so many have copies of Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, but very unfortunate that so few have read it. The alleged “supply chain” problems we’re enduring right now were explained by Smith in the book’s opening pages.

Smith wrote about a pin factory, and the then remarkable truth that one man in the factory working alone could maybe – maybe – produce one pin each day. But several men working together could produce tens of thousands.

Work divided is what enables the very work specialization that drives enormous productivity. If this was true in an 18th century pin factory, imagine how vivid the truth is today. Figure that something as basic as the creation of a pencil is the consequence of global cooperation, so what kind of remarkable global symmetry leads to the creation of an airplane, car, or computer?  The kind that can’t be planned is the short answer, but more realistically the only answer.

Please keep this in mind as you read media coverage of the so-called “supply-chain disruptions” resulting in “shortages” that are said to be causing “inflation.” If you want a bigger laugh, read about what President Biden wants to do in order to get “supply” back on the market with an eye on replenishing U.S. retail shelves that are increasingly bare. He’s decreed 24-hour port operations! Yes, thanks to the 46th president we now know what held the Soviets back, and ultimately destroyed the Soviet Union: their ports weren’t open long enough; thus the shortages of everything

All of the above would be funny if it weren’t so sad. Media members, “experts,” economists, and politicians don’t even disappoint anymore. To say they do would be to flatter them.

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

This is not 1997

This is not 1997

Not that minimum wages are anything new.  The USA introduced its Federal Minimum Wage as far back as 1938; although today each state sets its own rate.  And the general consensus is that minimum wages help raise wages in general with little or no impact on employment as a whole.  The broad theory being that by increasing wages at the bottom – where people’s propensity to spend is higher – we increase demand across the economy.  As the economy grows, demand for labour increases and forces wages up still further.  And so, demand rises and promotes further growth.Although introduced to the UK by a Labour government, the National Minimum Wage is closer to the Tory approach to economic policy.  This is because it passes the costs onto someone other than the state immediately.  In this case, Britain’s employers.  Labour governments, in contrast, have generally sought the politically easier approach of passing costs onto future generations via public borrowing… which was often the better policy if a combination of inflation and growth served to lower the real cost of the debt even as the state’s ability to repay it became easier.

This was no doubt the outcome desired by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown when they were elected in 1997.  After two decades of suppressed wages – first under James Callaghan, and then under Thatcher – and despite the deregulation of the City of London and the increasing revenues from North Sea oil and gas, it was hoped that a legal minimum wage would generate the growth needed to lift people out of poverty.  In neoliberal terms, it would “make work pay.”

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

Corporate Greed the ‘Real Culprit Behind Rising Prices,’ Researchers Say

Corporate Greed the ‘Real Culprit Behind Rising Prices,’ Researchers Say

“The more sway mega-corporations have over our economy, the more power they have to gouge customers, squeeze Main Street, and exploit workers.”

Amid mounting data showing that people are paying more for food at grocery stores around the United States, a new analysis out Wednesday reveals how corporate power is “the real culprit behind rising prices at the checkout line.”

“Addressing this crisis means recognizing these price increases for what they are: the result of deeply entrenched concentrated corporate power.”

After the U.S. Labor Department announced that the Consumer Price Index increased by 0.4% in September, researchers at the Groundwork Collaborative, a progressive think tank, explained the connections between “price hikes, monopoly, and corporate greed.”

“The more sway mega-corporations have over our economy, the more power they have to gouge customers, squeeze Main Street, and exploit workers,” Rakeen Mabud, chief economist at the Groundwork Collaborative, said in a statement.

Since September 2020, food prices overall have increased by 4.6%, with the price of meats, poultry, fish, and eggs surging the most over the past 12 months, at 10.5%.

The higher inflation rate in those industries, researchers noted, can be attributed to decades of consolidation, which has given a handful of corporations an ever-greater degree of market control and with it, the power to set prices.

According to the Groundwork Collaborative:

Just four meat processing conglomerates control more than 80% of the beef industry and more than 60% of the pork industry. This enables them to dictate prices that both flatten returns for farmers and ranchers and inflate prices for consumers at the meat counter. As a result, consumers have seen a 12% increase in the cost of beef and a nearly 10% increase in the cost of pork over the last year…

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

Olduvai IV: Courage
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Olduvai II: Exodus
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