Money, Markets & New Age Investing

Twenty-two global Central Banks held meetings this past week to decide what, if any, changes they would make to their monetary policy stance. More than one-third of those Central Banks (8) voted to CUT their official short-term Policy Rate, TWICE as many as voted to raise rates (4), while 10 of 22 left policy unchanged.

Of those Central Banks that left rates unchanged, the majority of them communicated belief that they wou...

You have heard me warning about a coming crisis in US Commercial Real-Estate and how it would link to Small Banks, not only here in the US, but around the world. Moreover, I warned in December about Small Bank Balance Sheets, and cited that as the likely REASON WHY the Fed abandoned their hawkish rhetoric at the year-end meeting. 
 
You have heard me warning about a coming Consumer credit problem, particularly as it relates...

In Episode #3 of Season Two Greg offers an in depth look at three countries which reflect the three primary and dominant macro-economic "backdrops" - Stagflation, Inflation and Deflation.

Each of these locations offer crystal clear evidence within the data and the market positioning and thus gives us clues as to how these scenarios may emerge in other countries, including the Anglo-nations (AKA USA, United Kingd...

What Does the FOMC Know, That the Markets Don't? 

Alternative Title: "Jerome Powell goes Mandelbaum on the Market!"
 
Indeed, Jerome Powell and the FOMC stunned markets last week as the US Central Bank did NOT verbally "protest" the uber-dovish Fed Funds Rates "priced into" the futures market for end-2024 (roughly 4.50%, down from 5.00% in October), but rather went DEEPER and MORE...

What began as the smallest of dovish comments among a broad range of hawkish “Fedspeak” from Chairman Powell in his post-FOMC press conference earlier this month, became a rallying cry for many market participants wanting to celebrate their belief that Fed is positioning itself to REFILL the proverbial monetary "punch bowl“… 
 
 ...and...that the risk-on PARTY has started again, after eighteen months of inflation-induc...

I asked rhetorically in a research piece I wrote last week...is Jerome Powell a "con man"?
 
Of course the answer is a resounding NO. Jay Powell has talked the talk and then walked the walk. He has told us what he thinks, he has told us what he will do, and then he does it, ever since 2018 and the publication of eleven Fed White Papers defining the "new monetary paradigm", which proposed to let inflation...

Just as inflation has retreated and it at least appears that a soft landing is not such a far-fetched thought as we once might have believed, BAM, the "perfect storm" is unleashed on the markets in the Middle East, in what could become a worst-case-scenario. 

We start with China, where the PBOC has remains TIGHT even as the economic data erodes as is best evidenced by a multi-month decline in the year-year rate o...

Irresponsible money printing and out-of-control deficit spending, exacerbated by (ongoing) supply-demand fundamentals that are increasingly skewed towards supply side issues (AKA shortages relative to demand) leads to inflation (AKA more money chasing fewer goods). 

Inflation leads to a decline in the purchasing power of paper currencies (globally), which in turn leads to an overtly and unrelentingly hawkish monetary policy from Cen...

In this business one must put ego aside and be willing to be wrong, a lot. Success comes down to unearthing the facts, digging deep into the data-details, connecting the dots globally, and putting ALL the little pieces together to build a picture that reflects the FACTS as they relate to the current situation. 

From there we must be open minded to changes in the macro-monetary environment while conjuring up and contemplati...

Is it Mark William Calaway? … or Jerome Powell? … will the REAL "Undertaker" please stand up!

Indeed, the modern-day version of legendary WWF superstar and World Champion "The Undertaker" is none other than the current Chair of the US Federal Reserve Bank, Jerome Powell ... who continued his Steel Cage Death Match this past Friday while on tour in Jackson Hole. Powell has spent the last year wrestling w...

The average Consumer in the US has been forced to borrow money just to pay the monthly bills, and while Consumers have exhaled a sigh-of-relief as inflation spiraled back "down" to 3%...little do they realize the WAR is not over. No, the war has only just begun, as the "base effect" in Energy, THE primary force that drove inflation lower, is done, finished, over, GONE! ...to be replaced next month by a sharp yea...

The infamous "line" from the Hollywood classic "Animal House", when freshman Delta pledge "Flounder" walks into a smokey room with frat brothers sitting around several poker tables and cluelessly asks … "Are you guys playing cards?" 

Today, Greg asks that question of the Fed … using the Fed meeting Minutes from the June Central Bank pow-wow as the likely answer, and then delves into the intric...

In Episode #9, before Greg gets to the intensifying and already vicious El Nino that has become dominant in the Pacific Ocean...he discusses the Fed and monetary policy, the disinflation in the year over year rate of change in CPI inflation to just 4%, and the polarized price action in the US Dollar. 

Then Greg takes on the US Federal Budget numbers for May, and breaks down what this NIGHTMARE is really all about...enablin...

While all focus is on the “Debt Ceiling” buffoonery...the Retail Sales report revealed DEEP and DEEPENING contraction in Sales within nearly EVERY type of Discretionary sector-industry…particularly the heretofore resilient Building Material and Garden Supply stores.  At the same time the Fed continues to turn apathetic and complacent phrase when asked about the banking system, saying they EXPECT further tightening in “credit condit...

Ahead of the May 3rd meeting of the US Federal Reserve Bank's FOMC (Federal Open Market Committee) the debate is raging ... will and should the Fed hike their official short-term interest (policy) rate again, or not. 

 The year-year rate-of-change in the US Consumer Price Index has disinflated to "only" +5.0% amid a massive single-month decline posted for March as the Energy "Base Effect" started to impact t...

Over the last fifty-two weeks Bitcoin has outperformed the US Stock market (S+P 500 Index) by +42.9%, while Ethereum has outperformed the S+P 500 by +27.2%, and Gold has outperformed by +17.0% despite a +4% appreciation in the US Dollar Index over the last year.

The FOMC’s about-face on Balance Sheet “shrinkage” (AKA QT) and expansion of $297 billion in a single week, THE LARGEST EVER (excluding three consecutive weeks at the height...

Fed Chairman Jerome Powell has summoned the ghost of Paul Volcker, circa 1978, with a monetary regime that is hell-bent on generating PAIN, economic pain, as a means to "defeating" inflation. Powell has pledged to use the Volcker "playbook", draconian rate hikes that squelches final demand to bring it into line with lower supply, even if it means sparking a recession. But it goes further, as Powell cannot justif...

Greg discusses the UNPRECEDENTED growth in debt during 2022, both public debt and private debt, with the understanding that reliance on printing exponentially more and more money, as a means of economic survival, is ultimately a losing hand. This is especially true when Global Debt holds an unbeatable hand, an Ace-High Royal Flush, suited in Diamonds (for the obvious irony) … 10 of Diamonds is Private Debt (Consumer, Corporate, Unf...

Wow, SO much to talk about in Episode #3. Greg starts with a discussion of US Household sentiment as it pertains to their current/future financial "situation", for better, or worse. Further, he looks back at inflation in 2022, linking it to depleted Household Savings, record consumer credit creation, and outright deflation in "real" wages-income, along with a massive "liquidity drain" in the monetary s...