Analysis Topic: Interest Rates and the Bond Market
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Monday, July 24, 2023
The Fed as Bad Bank Ultimate Irony / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank
A historical paradigm shift is in progress. The process of de-Dollarization began with Russia in response to the Maidan coup in Kiev back in 2016. The Russian reacted in multiple ways, but the Eurasian Trade Zone grew. That was the Jackass name given, which has emerged as the BRICS Union in recent years. Numerous nations have followed the Russian lead in removing the USDollar from their trade payments and banking practices. The American observers have dismissed this trend as trivial and not enduring. They are wrong, dead wrong. In the last 18 months, the Japanese had dumped $240 billion in USTreasury Bonds over a 12-month period. They continue. They accumulate Gold in their banking reserves, thus following the BRICS theme, their operating policy. The macrocosm, by contrast, will feature 20 nations dumping USTBonds en masse, and acquiring Gold for banking reserves. The UAE will become a primary office for the conversion, their Dirham notably pegged to the USD.
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Sunday, June 18, 2023
Fed Claims It CAN Resume Rate Hikes While Doubts Grow / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
As the Federal Reserve begins to back off on tightening, the U.S. dollar is becoming increasingly vulnerable to selling.The Fed left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at just above 5% at this week's policy meeting. It was the first time in over a year that central bankers decided not to hike.
In his remarks, Fed chairman Jerome Powell tried to maintain a hawkish tone despite the dovish policy move. He vowed to deliver more rate hikes later this year.
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Friday, June 16, 2023
US Interest Rate A Pause Like Nonother / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
The Bank of Canada paused its rate hiking cycle in January but then hiked rates at its last meeting. The
Royal Bank of Australia paused in April but then had to start hiking again in June. The Fed also paused at
its June meeting or at least skipped a rate hike. This was the case even though core inflation rose 0.4%
month over month from April to May and was still up 5.3% from a year ago.
Tuesday, May 16, 2023
US Debt Ceiling Crisis Smoke and Mirrors Circus / Interest-Rates / US Debt
It's definitely the time to bring out the clowns as MSM and much of the blogosfear are obsessed by the US debt ceiling smoke and mirrors circus that is being used as an excuse to explain potential market outcomes from a CRASH upwards, there is always a crash coming! And if the market soars then no problem it will soar because of debt ceiling positive developments, Whether UP or Down it will all be as a consequence of the DEBT CEILING! I have watched this circus take place every couple of years over the decades, it IS just a circus act for the Republicans and Democrats to prance around in front of the media, a smoke and mirrors TV show to remind the masses that they have all of the power and so if the chose to nuke the US economy.
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Saturday, April 29, 2023
Corporate Bonds: "The Next Shoe to Drop" / Interest-Rates / Corporate Bonds
"The neckline has been broken over the last few days"
A "calamity" is likely ahead for corporate bonds, says our head of global research, Murray Gunn.
Some of Murray's analysis involves the head and shoulders, a classic technical chart pattern. In case you're unfamiliar with it, here's an illustration along with an explanation from one of our past publications:
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Tuesday, April 18, 2023
US Treasury Bond Market Yield Curve / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
That was one hell off a drop in the 2 year yield yesterday, went straight from 5% to 4%. Now US rates are on par with where they were when the S&P was trading at 4200, of course it's not as simple as that, the rate fell in response to the Fed bailout of the banking crime syndicate. Still this should be positive for stocks.
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Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Interest Rates Should Continue To Fall, Eventually Setting Up A Bond Market Crash / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
If you have been reading my public articles on TLT over the last half a year, then you would know of my expectation to see the bond market rally into 2023, and rates falling into 2023.
When I first put this expectation out last year, many (even some of my own clients) thought I was simply crazy. With rates skyrocketing towards 5%, most were quite certain that we would easily eclipse that point, and move well towards 6% and even higher. And, of course, the reason most maintained that expectation was due to the Fed’s public position of continuing to raise rates.
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Saturday, April 01, 2023
The Fed Knew / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank
Should we leave the creation of new money in the hands of bankers or place its creation solely with our government?
“The financial system used by all national economies worldwide is actually founded upon debt. To be direct and precise, modern money is created in parallel with debt…
The creation and supply of money is now left almost entirely to banks and other lending institutions. Most people imagine that if they borrow from a bank, they are borrowing other people’s money. In fact, when banks and building societies make any loan, they create new money. Money loaned by a bank is not a loan of pre-existent money; money loaned by a bank is additional money created. The stream of money generated by people, businesses and governments constantly borrowing from banks and other lending institutions is relied upon to supply the economy as a whole. Thus the supply of money depends upon people going into debt, and the level of debt within an economy is no more than a measure of the amount of money that has been created.” Michael Rowbotham, ‘The Grip of Death’
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Sunday, February 26, 2023
Fed President Worried the Fed Risks a Repeat of the 1970s / Interest-Rates / Inflation
Gold and silver markets drifted lower again this week as investors braced for additional Fed rate hikes to come.
On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve released the minutes from its latest policy meeting. Policymakers agreed on the need for additional increases in interest rates. They settled on just a 0.25% bump up at their last meeting. But some dissenters called for a larger 0.5% hike.
Friday, December 30, 2022
Major Fed Myth: Debunked - Fed is Reactive in Setting Rates – Not Proactive / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
The days of near-zero interest rates are long gone -- at least for now.
As we look back on 2022, we know that it's been a year of rising interest rates, and many observers say it's all due to the Fed.
But it's a flat-out myth that the Fed determines the trend of interest rates. The market does. The Fed merely.
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Monday, December 26, 2022
US Debt Jubilee / Interest-Rates / US Debt
A cross-the-board ‘Debt Jubilee’ might sound radical, but a reading of history shows that retiring debt can actually make a country’s economy, and its indebted citizenry, all the better for it. There is even a relatively recent example. In 2000, U2 front man Bono launched a campaign to provide debt relief to developing countries. The Jubilee 2000 coalition managed to get the G8 to agree to write off $100 billion in debts that developing countries owed to developed nations.
The term ‘Jubilee’ comes from the Old Testament. The book of Deuteronomy refers to a sabbath year during which any slaves would be freed, and everyone would be allowed to return to their family farms and live off the land. During the Jubilee, all debt obligations would be forgiven — such as land or crops that debtors had pledged to creditors.
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Saturday, December 24, 2022
Why the Fed Intertest Rates Pivot will Happen Faster than People Think / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
Most market participants see the Fed’s tightening policy as similar to what Paul Volcker’s Fed did in the late 1970s, when double-digit inflation necessitated a cycle of rate hikes that brought the federal funds rate to 20%. Volcker succeeded in taming inflation but the price was the 1982 recession, considered one of the longest and worst in economic history.
There is one crucial difference between 1982 and 2022, and that is the debt. According to the FRED chart below, the US debt to GDP ratio in 1982 was around 35%. Today it is more than three times higher, at 120%.
This severely limits how much and how quickly the Fed can raise interest rates, due to the amount of interest that the federal government must pay on its debt.
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Thursday, November 24, 2022
Why INTEREST RATE HIKES Are INFLATIONARY! / Interest-Rates / Inflation
Unfortunately I will have to leave this mostly for next time. But basically INTEREST RATE HIKES to bring INFLATION DOWN! Is NOT going to work because INTEREST RATES DO NOT CONTROL the RATE of INFLATION. So that which academics have built their whole careers on is BS! All I hear is Volcker raised rates that brought inflation down and so rinse and repeat, was it Interest rates that killed the Inflation of the 1970's? Are you sure your not lapping up the propaganda which is ECONOMICs perpetuated by the propaganda arms of Governments called central banks who's primary remit is to put up a smoke screen of misinformation so as to allow governments, to get away with printing money!
As I have voiced for well over a decade, Inflation is a function of governments PRINTING MONEY, of which QE is part of the equation i.e print money to monetize government debt, which despite all of the noise continues to this very day! Governments printing money on an epic scale for which the smoking gun is the Governments deficit spending, the US Federal Government is spending $1.4 trillion more than it earns in revenue that is PRINTING MONEY! For the UK it's about £120 billion,
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Thursday, November 24, 2022
Are I-Bonds Predicting a drop in Inflation ? / Interest-Rates / Inflation
A patron commented - Interesting take on inflation: the US Treasury I-bonds (which one can invest $10k each year) will pay an annualized interest from November 1, 2022, through April 2023 of 6.89%, down from the 9.62% rate offered since May 2022. Probably an indicator that the inflation stats that are forthcoming will show we’ve peaked. https://treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/i-bonds/i-bonds-interest-rates/
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Monday, November 07, 2022
Powell May Be Planning a Post-Election Fed Pivot / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
The U.S. Dollar Index (DXY) took a dive last Friday following a middling jobs report. Could the move be the start of a bigger breakdown?
The DXY, a measure of the dollar’s relative strength versus a basket of foreign currencies, peaked in late September. Since then it has fallen into a sideways trading range, failing to make new highs despite another jumbo rate hike by the Federal Reserve last week.
Currency traders may be looking ahead – specifically to the likelihood of a U.S. economic downturn in 2023. The potential of another housing-led Great Financial Crisis also looms.
Sunday, November 06, 2022
The 78 Year Interest Rate Cycle - Why Investors in U.S. Treasuries Face Major Risk / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
Rising rates will be "disastrous" for governments, other debtors and creditors
The market for U.S. Treasuries is the biggest bond market in the world, and it appears that potentially big trouble may be afoot.
Earlier this month, none other than the U.S. Treasury Secretary herself (Janet Yellen) acknowledged ...
... "a loss of adequate liquidity in the [U.S. government debt] market."
Then, in a statement last week, Bank of America strategists expressed concerns about ...
... "large scale forced selling [of U.S. Treasuries]."
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Thursday, November 03, 2022
Fed Hawkish Interest Rate Pivot / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
This latest bear-market bounce was predicated on good seasonality, the hopes for a typical mid-term election boost, and the rumors of a Fed pivot. Wall Street always finds a narrative for rallies in a bear market. But the negative economic and liquidity cycles remain unchanged: The Fed is hiking rates into a recession. Powell may have done his last 75bp rate hike on November 2nd. But another 50bp hike is likely coming in December, and then the regular 25bp variety is coming in February. Meanwhile, $95 billion per month of Quantitative Tightening is rapidly destroying the money supply.
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Wednesday, November 02, 2022
SMASHED Bond Markets Brewing Opportunity / Interest-Rates / International Bond Market
The consensus script is that when stocks fall bonds go up, instead 2022 saw that consensus view blown apart as the below chart illustrates. In fact bonds have NEVER under performed stocks during a downturn, not even during the raging inflation of the 1970's!
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Friday, October 28, 2022
FED Balance Sheet QE4Ever / Interest-Rates / Quantitative Easing
Not to forget the inflation mega-trend courtesy of rampant central bank money printing to monetize government debt coupled with the fake inflation indices where up until recently the Fed had succeeded in hoodwinking the masses that US inflation was just 1%. Instead at that time I warned it was more like 6%! Now it's more like 14%. Anyway the money printing binge now totals $8.8 trillion, up from $4 trillion at the start of 2020 and down from a a peak of $9.62 trillion in the so called Taper. We saw how the taper of 2019 went which at the time I warned would eventually resolve in the Fed Balance sheet DOUBLING. of course I was not expecting it to happen the very NEXT YEAR in 2020!
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Wednesday, October 26, 2022
TIPS BONDS FAKE INFLATION PROTECTION! / Interest-Rates / Inflation
How to protect one self form INFLATION! Well what the investment industry sold to their clients were Inflation Protected Bond funds! The sales pitch went that when Inflation soars and regular bonds fall don't worry you are protected so given that inflation has taken off like a rocket have these bond funds delivered on their sales pitch?
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