For decades the United States has benefited from the dollar being the world’s reserve currency. That has allowed the Federal Reserve System to inflate the money supply and the federal government to issue debt at levels they otherwise would not have been able to get away with. With a ready market for US Treasury debt, foreign nations have long...
After threats to establish its own alternative system to enable trade with Iran failed to move the United States government, the European Union went ahead with its plans to operate a “special purpose vehicle” to enable European countries to trade with Iran. The vehicle, known as the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX) will initially focus on pharmaceutical,...
While much of the attention over the attempt to force Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro out of office has focused on Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, less attention has been paid to Maduro’s attempts to sell off Venezuela’s gold. Just over two years into a hyperinflationary crisis created by Maduro’s unlimited printing of money, Maduro is desperate for any cash he...
Last week’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting made it clear that the Federal Reserve has caved to pressure to bring its gradual tightening of monetary policy to an early and unplanned halt. Between pressure from President Trump and pressure from markets who want to see the stock market bull run continue for several more years, the Fed’s decision-making...
The federal government reopened this week after the longest shutdown ever. But while most Americans saw national parks and federal museums shuttered and assumed that the rest of the government was closed in a similar manner, that wasn’t really the case. In fact, despite the hundreds of thousands of federal workers furloughed or made to work without pay during...
With stock markets around the world on edge and investors nervous about what the future might hold, everyone is looking at central banks for guidance. You would think that they would have learned their lesson from the 2008 financial crisis, caused as it was by loose monetary policy. But ignorance of sound economics has left many people looking to...
While Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell is widely regarded by markets as having caved in to President Trump and having agreed to tone down the Fed’s rate hikes in 2019, some of his other statements have been less well publicized. Among them was his assertion that he would not step down from his position if asked by the President....
Last Friday the Dow Jones rebounded from a horrendous Thursday session to notch a nearly 750-point gain. The reason for that? As with previous rallies over the past few months, it was comments made by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome “Jay” Powell. Powell, who has come under significant pressure from President Trump recently to pause the Fed’s rate hikes or...
As 2019 begins, many market observers will be watching the Federal Reserve carefully for signs of a change in monetary policy. Markets had been hopeful that the Fed wasn’t going to raise rates in December, but it stuck to its guns. The reaction, predictably, was a huge fall in stock markets. But with the Fed seeming to indicate that...
Markets had been pricing in a December Fed rate hike all year. But with President Trump’s comments expressing his disappointment at the Fed’s hiking of rates this year, and Fed Chairman Jay Powell’s comments attempting to placate both the markets and the President, many on Wall Street were hopeful that the Fed would dispense with hiking rates last week....