Free Republic

It’s just another day in the life of that lovable, laughable economic farce known as Erdoganomics (yes, it’s even more laughable and idiotic than MMT, if one can believe that), where cutting interest rates in the middle of hyperinflation is supposed to fix everything. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that, and the latest CPI and PPI data out of Turkey today confirmed as much. Turkey’s inflation soared in May to the fastest since 1998 as the continued surge in food and energy was not helped by the country’s ultra-loose monetary policy. Consumer prices rose an annual 73.5%, up from 70%...

A year ago, ahead of the consensus, we argued that inflation was underestimated. Now it is time to warn about the coming slowdown. Like then, our view is unfashionable. Indeed, in the past week equity markets staged a strong comeback, a sign that investor spirits are recovering from their soggy start to 2022. As we note below, that bounce back isn’t entirely without justification. But it isn’t likely to enjoy much follow through, either. Several factors have underpinned the most recent recovery of risk assets. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell assuaged fears by offering an unusual degree of clarity about...

Economist John Williams says the economy is in deep trouble, and the Fed knows it.Williams says the Fed talking up “robust economic growth” that is causing inflation is “nonsense.” Williams explains, “The one thing that is not causing inflation is ‘robust economic growth.’ So, when they talk about raising interest rates to kill this robust economic growth that’s triggering the inflation, that’s absurd, and the Fed knows it… If the Fed foolishly raised rates as reflected in the payrolls as not being fully recovered, you are going to have a sharp downturn, a double dip depression here. At the same...

Peter Schiff discusses whether the current inflation will turn into hyperinflation and how to protect your savings and investments. The Rob Schmitt Show on Newsmax 1/11/22. Segment...

Think 6.8% CPI is high? Think again: this morning long-suffering Turks living in Erdogan’s macroeconomic experiment woke up to learn that the country’s annual inflation rate surged to 36.1% last month, its highest in the 19 years Tayyip Erdogan has ruled, blowing away expectations of “only” 27.4%, and laying bare the depths of a currency crisis engineered by the president’s unorthodox interest rate-cutting policies. Staples such as transportation and food – which took increasing shares of households’ budgets during 2021 – rose even fasterIn December alone, consumer prices soared by a hyperinflation-like double-digits, rising 13.58%, the Turkish Statistical Institute said...

As Lira Implodes, Turkey Proposes Huge Fines For “Hoarding” On one hand Turkey’s currency is crashing because the country’s ruthless despot refuses to allow higher interest rates (in hopes the ensuing hyperinflationary collapse will cover his pillaging of Turkey’s wealth as he will simply blame “foreign financial terrorists” for what has been the biggest heist of Turkey’s wealth in modern history). And sure enough, the TRY fell another 2.75% today to a fresh all time low ahead of tomorrow’s insane rate cut by the Turkish central bank which will send the lira plunging even more in the coming days and...

A few months ago, when prices began to spike throughout the U.S. economy, Americans were told not to worry, it was just a temporary blip. On several occasions, President Biden and high-ranking officials in his administration claimed the current bout of inflation was “transitory” and would subside sooner rather than later. Yet, as the months tick by, inflation is getting worse, not better.

Inflationary pressures on the U.S. economy are getting so bad that even The Washington Post acknowledged that media arguments banging the transitory drum are falling flat. The Post economics correspondent Heather Long wrote a damning news piece headlined, “Uncomfortable inflation is here, and it’s changing the economy.” Long wrote: “American families and businesses are altering their habits as they increasingly believe high prices are here to stay.” Long reported that “[n]ews this week that U.S. inflation is running at a 13-year high of 5.4 percent confirmed what many Americans already know as they juggle their budgets: Food, energy and shelter...

Liberal Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey shocked the Twitterverse with a warning about impending hyperinflation in the world, and predicted it would soon hit the United States. Dorsey, who oversees one of the largest offenders of Big Tech censorship, didn’t pull any punches about the danger: “Hyperinflation is going to change everything. It’s happening.” Twitter went berserk, with over 3,600 retweets and over 15,000 likes just over an hour after the tweet was posted.

And even all that spending isn’t enough: Social Security’s “unfunded liabilities” — how much money the government would need today to make up the difference between the money that will be paid into Social Security in the future and the benefits that have been promised — is about $40 trillion. How much is $40 trillion? It is all the money in the world — literally: All the cash in circulation, plus all the deposits in checking accounts and savings accounts, adds up to about $40 trillion. That is a big hole to climb out of. Just as inflation can cause...

Snip: Yellen also warned that not raising the debt limit would injure the economy in July. This issue was not addressed in the $5 trillion of spending pushed through last week. Newsweek reported in July: Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned members of Congress on Friday that if the debt ceiling is not raised, it will risk “irreparable harm to the U.S. economy and the livelihoods of all Americans,” according to the Daily Caller. In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Yellen expressed that she did not know how long the Treasury Department could keep the United States from defaulting...

Saudi and Russian officials Tuesday announced the signing of military cooperation pact between the two countries. Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman announced the agreement via Twitter, stating it would aid in “developing joint military cooperation between the two countries.” In a second tweet, he elaborated on his meeting with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Shoygu, in which the pair explored ways to “strengthen the military and defense cooperation between our two countries.” I signed an agreement today with the Russian Deputy Minister of Defense Colonel General Alexander Fomin between the Kingdom and the Russian Federation aimed at developing joint military...

...Despite the federal government spending a staggering $5.3 trillion since March 2020 and the passage of a $1.1 trillion infrastructure bill, Biden and his fellow Democrats are pushing additional spending as part of a $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation package. An independent analysis by the nonprofit Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that the real costs of that package are over $5 trillion if scored honestly. Those numbers aren’t just staggering, they are all but unfathomable... It doesn’t take an economist to see the inflationary impact. Restaurant Business, an industry publication, recently ran an article bluntly titled “Yes, It’s OK...

As of Friday, over 2.3 million people had signed a Change.org petition urging lawmakers to pass legislation for recurring $2,000 monthly payments. Initially, 21 senators, all Democrats, signed a letter to President Biden in late March supporting recurring stimulus payments

At the start of May, when observing the avalanche of “higher inflation” mentions on Q1 earnings calls, which had quadrupled YoY; and jumped by a record 800% YoY…… BofA chief equity strategist Savita Subramanian summarized the current state of affairs as follows: “On an absolute basis, [inflation] mentions skyrocketed to near record highs from 2011, pointing to at the very least, “transitory” hyper-inflation ahead.”Needless to say, a “serious” bank warning of hyperinflation – transitory or otherwise – was enough to spark very serious concerns that the Fed was losing control of prices, a panic which only grew after Deutsche Bank...

It has been a week of staggering home prices increase news which has seen the median existing home price surge to a record $350,000…… up a whopping 24% from a year ago…… while today we learned that the median new home price surged 18%, also to a record $374,400 (the average selling price was also a record $430,600)…… the result being a collapse in homebuyer sentiment…… leading to a sharp slowdown in actual sale transactions, as the soaring prices start to adversely impact the broader market.Remarkably summing up what’s going on in the housing market, veteran housing analyst Ivy Zelman...

A little over a month ago, BofA spooked even the most dovish elements on Wall Street and in the Marriner Eccles building, when the bank said that judging by the explosion of references to surging prices in Q1 earnings calls, the bank concluded that this “pointing to at the very least, “transitory” hyper-inflation ahead.” Yes… really: Fast forward to today when BofA’s economist Alex Lin quantified what his bank qualified to so many shocked gasps one month ago. As Lin writes, with core CPI inflation at 3.8% yoy in May, “we must assess how much of the acceleration in inflation...

Consumer Price Index (CPI) data for April came in much hotter than expected. Year-on-year, inflation is up 4.2%. The big number even prompted Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Richard Clarida to say, “We were surprised by higher than expected inflation data.”Peter Schiff appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show to talk about the consequences of more printed money chasing fewer goods. Peter said inflation is going to hit the middle class harder than the pandemic.Peter said this hot CPI print is a cause for concern and ultimately it is a tax.It is the inflation tax. And if you look at how much the...

BofA: "Transitory Hyperinflation Ahead" Last week, when discussing the latest earnings call commentary, Bank of America said "Buckle up! Inflation is here", and showed a chart of the number of mentions of “inflation”… Last week, when discussing the latest earnings call commentary, Bank of America said "Buckle up! Inflation is here", and showed a chart of the number of mentions of “inflation” during earnings calls which exploded, more than tripling YoY per company so far, the and the biggest jump in history since BofA started keeping records in 2004. Who knew that just one week later BofA would need a...

Well looky here, MSM finally noticed that prices might be inching up a tad: Don’t worry though: it’s just transitory.Quick: name the last time this country experienced hyper-inflation. *hint* I’m guessing the ‘Bidens-in-a Hobbit-house’ effect is the result of either an amateur or an auteur photographer. Either way it’s a pretty clever illustration: the incredible shrinking Carters symbolizing the incredible shrinking dollar that comes with hyper-inflation. Doesn’t appear to be that transitory from my perspective though.Posted from: MOTUS A.D.