Category: Markets
Markets
Lack of price discovery killing capitalism
The economic problem with government bail-outs and intervention is they act as a huge economic player, keeping rates artificially low and stimulating those companies that work directly with the government. The economic problem with this is that while the large companies can remain afloat with this support, very little ‘trickles down’ to small enterprises which […]
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Fed Gets Bigger in Markets as QE Prompts New Tools
By Caroline Salas Gage and Liz Capo McCormick – Oct 14, 2013 The Federal Reserve is getting more involved in debt markets as it tries to compensate for the impact of its almost $4 trillion balance sheet on short-term interest rates. Policy makers are testing a new tool intended to improve their control of near-term […]
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World top bankers warn of dire consequences if U.S. defaults
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Three of the world’s most powerful bankers warned of terrible consequences if the United States defaults on its debt, with Deutsche Bank chief executive Anshu Jain claiming default would be “utterly catastrophic.” “This would be a very rapidly spreading, fatal disease,” Jain said on Saturday at a conference hosted by the Institute […]
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The Dollar and the Debt Ceiling
10 October 2013 BERKELEY – The dollar is the world’s go-to currency. But for how much longer? Will the dollar’s status as the only true global currency be irreparably damaged by the battle in the US Congress over raising the federal government’s debt ceiling? Is the dollar’s “exorbitant privilege” as the world’s main reserve currency […]
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Is U.S. Political Bubble About to Burst?
The markets shuddered slightly as the debt ceiling neared. The yield on short-term Treasuries has risen tenfold. Fidelity Investments sold off its short-term government debt. But the shudder was slight — and today saw a relief rally in equities on news that House Republicans might agree to suspend the debt ceiling for six weeks in […]
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RBS Said to Pass Currency Trader Chats to FCA Amid Probe
By Gavin Finch and Liam Vaughan – Oct 9, 2013 Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc has handed over records of instant messages to U.K. regulators after concluding a former currency trader’s communications with counterparts at other firms may have been inappropriate, according to two people with knowledge of the matter. The messages related to […]
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Five Years in Limbo
08 October 2013 NEW YORK – When the US investment bank Lehman Brothers collapsed in 2008, triggering the worst global financial crisis since the Great Depression, a broad consensus about what caused the crisis seemed to emerge. A bloated and dysfunctional financial system had misallocated capital and, rather than managing risk, had actually created it. […]
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An Empire of Money and Privilege in Decline: Portrait of a Tragic Policy Error
“Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences.” Robert Louis Stevenson “They don’t have intelligence. They have what I call thintelligence. They see the immediate situation. They think narrowly and they call it ‘being focused.’ They don’t see the surroundings. They don’t see the consequences.” Michael Crichton The Fed is faced with […]
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