Our story thus far: The Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, sponsored by Texas Senator Phil Gramm as a favor to his wife Wendy (who sat on the Board of Directors of Enron, which wanted to trade energy derivatives without oversight) was rushed through Congress in 2000. Unread by Congress or their staffers, it was … Read more
In the old Soviet Union, Pravda, the official news agency, set the standard for “truth” in reporting. Discriminating readers needed to be adroit in sifting the words to discern the facts that lay beneath. Readers of The Economist’s “Special Report on Financial Innovation” (published on 23 February 2012) would do well to equip themselves with … Read more
As I’ve said many times, whenever you criticize the banks you get pushback from their employees and lawyers handling their home thefts (whoops I meant “foreclosures”). About ten days ago I posted a brief update on the state of play, and received the usual comments. (Here: https://www.economonitor.com/lrwray/2012/02/22/yes-virginia-foreclosure-is-theft/#idc-container) Indeed, they went beyond “usual” as one bank … Read more
The latest GDP data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis indicate that the output gap narrowed in Q4 2011 at a slightly more rapid pace than previously estimated. The second estimate, released February 29, showed US real GDP growing at a 3 percent annual rate last quarter, up from the 2.8 percent advance estimate released … Read more
Economic cheerleaders on Wall Street and in the White House are taking heart. The US has had three straight months of faster job growth. The number of Americans each week filing new claims for unemployment benefits is down by more than 50,000 since early January. Corporate profits are healthy. The S&P 500 on Friday closed … Read more
The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) released a report (Chinese language) this week that focused on prospects for capital account liberalization. Opening up the capital account would be a major reform, perhaps the most significant in a more than a decade. It would give Chinese savers an escape hatch from financial repression and force the … Read more
More than a year ago, I argued that China’s GDP in purchasing power parity (PPP) dollars had overtaken that of the United States in 2010. This calculation is used in my book, Eclipse: Living in the Shadow of China’s Economic Dominance and plays a role in my conclusion that China has overtaken or is close … Read more
By Chris Cook, former compliance and market supervision director of the International Petroleum Exchange. Cross posted from Asia Times The end game is about to begin. On the one hand you have the noise and rhetoric. Greedy speculators gouging gasoline prices; mad mullahs preparing to wipe Israel off the map; bunker buster bombs and fleets … Read more
The European Commission’s Economic and Financial Affairs initiated the Macroeconomic Imbalance Procedure (MIP) Scoreboard. The MIP Scorecard will be used to identify emerging or persistent macroeconomic imbalances in a country. In their inaugural release, the EC listed 12 EU countries in need of further review for potential imbalances (program countries are exempt from this review … Read more
Summary: This week Europe’s leaders faced a choice somewhat similar and perhaps equally momentous as America’s leaders faced in 1787. But this week they chose a path that looks punitive and short-sighted, pursuing European unification but likely to generate discord and eventually fragmentation. Seldom does one act determine the future, but they might find it difficult to … Read more