The Recovery Stalls; Fed Pledges “Lower for Longer;” Equity Markets Pause
With the Fed pledging to keep rates low even when (or if) inflation rises above its 2% target, it is hard to see why long-term Treasury yields (and those of other quality issuers) won’t move toward yields of similar debt in the world’s other industrial economies (i.e., Europe and Japan). The economic lull is now […]
Corona, Corona, Corona Bonds Really Do Have More Fun!
The equity market finally showed some sensitivity to the effects of the coronavirus (Covid-19) last week with the S&P 500 falling 1.25% from its record high close on Valentine’s day for the holiday shortened week. The leading issue which dominated every news cycle (except for the Democratic debate for a few hours) was Covid-19 and […]
Demographic Trends: The Case Against Negative Interest Rates
Japan has a 2.2% unemployment rate, yet, for 30 years, they have not had any significant economic growth, due to their demographic structure. Today, the developed world has Japan’s 1990s demographic features, with falling fertility rates, rising dependency ratios (retirees/working aged), and, ultimately, declining populations. Under these conditions, aggregate GDP growth will be harder and harder to […]
Look For The Preponderance Of The Evidence, Don’t Rely On One Factor
The headline on my LinkedIn page on Friday (October 4th) read: “Jobless rate reaches half-century low, HP plans to cut up to 9,000 jobs…” Is this good news about jobs, or bad? I’ve learned many times over the years to rely on the preponderance of the evidence, and not on any single indicator. The jobs numbers, themselves […]
The Goldilocks Labor Report: “Just Right!”
It isn’t ever a good sign when markets become manic. August was quite volatile with five days out of 22 (23%) where the S&P 500 intra-day market swings exceeded 2%, and three days when the market closed down more than -2.5% from the prior day’s close. (We haven’t seen such price volatility since 2011!) While, so far, September […]
The Rocky Road to “Normal”
The terms “normal,” “normalize,” and “neutral” are common in today’s economic discussions. But, does anybody really know what “normal” is? When the Federal Reserve (Fed) says that it wants to “normalize” interest rates, do they have a rate scheme in mind? Does it mean that rates will be similar to what they were 10-20 years ago? That’s […]