Free Republic

May 31, 2016 Jeff_Berwick It seems barely a day passes now without some big name person warning of imminent collapse. The latest is Alan Greenspan. In an interview on Thursday he told Fox News that Venezuela is now under martial law and that “America is next.” He said that what was happening in Venezuela was inevitably going to take place in the US. I agree with this. In fact, we said this exact thing just last week with our article, “Venezuela Descends Into Chaos… Europe and US Next.” Funny enough, a few brainwashed sheeple said we were crazy for saying...

A U.S. Federal Reserve Bank president said Monday the global markets seem to be poised for an interest rate hike this summer. James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis, said his outlook was not "too surprising" since signs are pointing to a second quarter rebound in the U.S. gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services produced in the U.S. Bullard's remarks, made at an international conference in Seoul, South Korea, follow revised data Friday from the U.S. Commerce Department that the economy expanded faster than previously thought in the first three months of...

Last Friday, May 20, 2016, something happened in the U.S. Senate you won’t hear about in the mainstream media. You can read about it here. Gary Aminoff comments in the following short video.

Chinese officials plan to ask their American counterparts in annual talks next month about the chance of a Federal Reserve interest-rate increase in June, according to people familiar with the matter. The Chinese delegation will try to deduce whether a June or a July rate rise is more likely, as the nation’s policy makers prepare for the potential impact on financial markets and the yuan, the people said, asking not to be named as the discussions were private. In China’s view, if the Fed does lift borrowing costs, a July move would be preferable, the people said. A People’s Bank...

When the economy stumbles, can the Fed still catch its fall? A growing number of economists, market analysts and investors worry that the answer is no. The Federal Reserve’s radical approach to monetary policy since the financial crisis, they believe, has confounded its ability to do anything about a potential downturn — or an unexpected shock to the economy. Worse, others argue that by staying with a zero interest rate for so long, the Fed has put itself into a box... ...the dilemma. The post-financial crisis economic recovery still looks shaky. The Atlanta Fed’s widely followed GDPNow number, a timely...

There are two possible explanations for why markets so badly misjudged how close the Federal Reserve is to resuming interest-rate hikes. One possibility is that investors misread Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s speech on March 29 asserting that “caution is especially warranted” when it comes to raising rates with global risks so high and policymakers so low on conventional ammunition to counteract a downturn. Yet it seems much more likely that markets received the surprisingly dovish message as it was intended and responded just as Yellen hoped, easing global stresses that had grown as the dollar’s rise exacerbated pressure on China...

Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton said she would support changes to the top ranks of the Federal Reserve, an issue recently championed by progressive groups amid debate over how long the central bank should keep supporting the American economy. The Fed is led by a seven-member board of governors based in Washington and a dozen regional bank presidents based across the country, from New York to Kansas City to San Francisco. The governors are nominated by the White House and approved by the Senate, but regional bank presidents are selected by their boards of directors, whose occupants are chosen by...

The U.S. Federal Reserve may need more powers to provide emergency funding to securities firms in times of extreme stress in order to deal with a liquidity crunch, New York Federal Reserve President William Dudley said on Sunday. "Providing these firms with access to the discount window might be worth exploring," Dudley said in prepared remarks at a financial markets conference in Amelia Island, Florida organized by the Atlanta Fed. The discount window is a credit facility through which banks borrow directly from the U.S. central bank in order to cope with liquidity shortages. The Fed currently has limited ability...

Anyone questioning the sustainability and rightness of The New Normal is immediately attacked by the mainstream-media defenders of the crumbling status quo. Not only is everything that broke in 2008 fixed, everything's going great globally, and anyone who dares question this narrative in a tin-foil hat conspiracy nut or simply an annoyingly doom-and-gloomer who recalcitrantly refuses to accept the positive glories of official statistics: low unemployment, rising valuations of stock market Unicorns, etc. But the New Normal is anything but normal; all the readings of artificial life-support and manipulation are off the charts. If the New Normal were indeed a...

“Negative interest rates” have become a phenomenon with economists and the media. But I’m writing to tell you something about negative interest rates you haven’t heard. You certainly won’t hear about it in the mainstream press. What’s coming at you is a historic event. It’s something our grandchildren will hear stories about, much like the Great Depression or the Cold War. It could send the price of gold much higher in the coming years. If you know what’s coming, it could mean the difference between having lots of free cash in retirement and barely getting by. And please remember this...

Donald Trump assailed the media on Monday for what he said was a misrepresentation of his comments on debt, rejecting the notion that he would have the United States default on his debt. "I said if we can buy back government debt as a discount. In other words, if interest rates go up and we can buy bonds back as a discount, if we are liquid enough as a country we should do that. In other words, we can buy back debt as a discount," the presumptive Republican nominee said in a telephone interview on CNN's "New Day." Those who...

The Winter of 2015-2016, which came to an end a few weeks ago, has been officially designated as the mildest in the U.S. in 121 years according to NOAA. While this fact will certainly add a major talking point in the global warming debate, it should also be front and center in the current economic discussion. The fact that it isn't is testament to the blatantly self-serving manner in which economic cheerleaders blame the weather when it's convenient, but ignore it when it's not. If economists were consistent (and that's a colossal "if"), the good weather would be taken as...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is happy with the job done by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, with whom he is meeting on Monday to discuss regulatory issues and world economy, the White House said. "The president has been pleased with the way she has fulfilled what is a critically important job," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said at a news briefing.

NEW YORK — Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen offered an upbeat view of the U.S. economy Thursday and affirmed the central bank’s next step is likely to raise interest rates. But the central-bank chief didn’t say when she wants the Fed to boost borrowing costs again. “We think a gradual path of rate increases will be appropriate” given the progress the economy has made and is likely to continue to make, Yellen said as part of a panel discussion involving all the living chairs of the Federal Reserve past and present. She was joined on stage at the International House...

Speaking before a packed audience at the prestigious Economic Club of New York, Fed chair Janet Yellen basically announced that there would be no rate hikes for quite some time - maybe once before year end, maybe not. Her key point was that the global economy is worse today than it was in December, back when the Fed took its target rate up a quarter point. I think she's right. I also think she is paying more attention to forward-looking, inflation-sensitive financial and commodity-market prices. This is good. Very good. Yellen cited shrinking inflation spreads in the Treasury bond market,...

Janet Yellen signaled that the Fed is grappling with the problem I have been warning about: the dollar has become the de facto currency and the Fed is indeed becoming the world’s central bank. Yellen has admitted that everyone is lobbying the Fed to surrender its domestic policy objectives for international ones. This is precisely what took place in 1927. Yellen stated that the Fed should worry less about inflation domestically than about global growth risks. She pointed to the slowdown in China and depressed commodity prices, but Europe is a real basket case. She used the words that “caution...

They say it's broccoli, and they say the hell with it. But Big Brother is watching you, kids: The federal government is taking steps to fine schools that do not comply with first lady Michelle Obama’s school lunch rules. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service issued a proposed rule Monday to codify parts of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, which was championed by Mrs. Obama. The regulation would punish schools and state departments with fines for “egregious or persistent disregard” for the lunch rules that imposed sodium and calorie limits and banned white grains.It can't happen...

Five consecutive weeks of gains makes it hard to argue that we’re in a bear market. While it may not seem like much has changed since the markets last swooned, a few key developments remain supportive of stock prices.In particular, a shifted stance on monetary policy, change in the trajectory of the dollar, and recovery in oil prices have turned sellers into buyers.The Fed Last Wednesday the Federal Reserve confirmed what many had anticipated going into the latest FOMC meeting: that the Fed would have to back off of its four-rate-hike plan for 2016.For some time now, the Fed’s...

Stocks haven't done much in a while. Wednesday marked the eight-straight day that the S&P 500 had closed less than 1 percent above or below its prior closing price. Ominously, the last time the market staged this long a period of quiescence was in early August — shortly before stocks took a gut-wrenching tumble. Now, as then, "we are at a precarious position," Erin Gibbs of S&P Investment Advisory said Wednesday on CNBC's "Trading Nation." "We're trading at fairly high valuation and earnings growth doesn't look that good, so any big shocks — disappointment from China, any movement from the...

The Federal Reserve's years-long campaign to sheepishly back away from its own policy forecasts continued in earnest last week when it officially reduced the four expected 2016 quarter point hikes, suggested back in December, to just two. Given the deteriorating economic outlook, I believe there can be little doubt that the Fed will soon complete the capitulation process and remove all expectations for additional hikes this year. Even before that happens, savvy observers should have already concluded that the Federal Reserve is stuck in the monetary mud just as firmly now as it has been since the dawn of the...