With President Trump’s revelation that he intends to place tariffs on all imports of Chinese goods, markets went haywire earlier this week. While tariffs on existing imports are rising to 25%, all Chinese imports will soon be subject to punitive tariffs. That will raise the cost of living not just for American consumers but for American businesses as well....
The universal response of central banks around the world to the financial crisis was to create more money. Trillions of dollars worth of new money was created by the Federal Reserve System to respond to the financial crisis, with trillions more created by the European Central Bank, Bank of England, Bank of Japan, and other major world central banks. The...
With President Trump’s decision on Friday to raise tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese imports from 10% to 25%, the stakes in the trade war with China just got higher. Trump’s move came while a Chinese delegation was in Washington negotiating a trade agreement, thus scuttling any chances of a successful resolution. China now feels like it has its...
Along with the Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives has come renewed attention towards a monetary theory beloved by many Democrats and their allies, including Bernie Sanders. That theory, Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) posits that a government cannot ever default on its debt because it can just print money to pay off that debt. Even worse, MMT proponents...
With new inflation data coming out this week, the gold price could see a bullish rise if inflation picks up. While official inflation rates always underestimate the actual price increases that most people see, indications of rising inflation could send more investors piling into gold. CPI data from March indicated an 0.4% increase, double the increase that was seen in...
Everyone who remembers the 2008 financial crisis remembers the role that collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) played in exacerbating the crisis. The way that financial companies packaged together billions of dollars of bad debt, diced and sliced them into securities that they then rated AAA, and sold them to unsuspecting investors seemed to be the epitome of the greed and...
President Trump doesn’t have a great track record in nominating people to the Federal Reserve Board, with several of his picks having decided to remove themselves from contention over the past couple of years. The latest two were his picks to fill the two remaining spots on the Fed’s Board of Governors, economist Stephen Moore and businessman Herman Cain. Both...
By now most people realize that the only reason stock markets have done so well over the past few years is because of the Federal Reserve’s loose monetary policy. Low interest rates have spurred companies to issue massive amounts of debt in order for them to be able to buy back their stock shares. In fact, over the past...
It’s no secret that central banks have been large buyers of gold over the past few years. Last year nearly set a record for gold purchases by central banks and the trend looks set to continue this year. But those central banks who already own gold are increasingly looking to hold onto it themselves. They no longer trust that...
One of the keys to the mainstream’s faith in the financial system is the belief that the Federal Reserve is actually capable of managing interest rates. The Fed eases policy to lower interest rates and tightens policy to raise interest rates. But what happens if the Fed loses control of interest rates? What happens if the Fed’s purchases and...