ricardian ambivalence

UK Labour booked a long date with opposition last night; the union movement pressed red-ed Miliband – the son of Marxist Ralph Miliband – to the leadership of their party. There is a risk that the various nationalistic-populist movements will mutate into a Smoot-Hawley policy error.

My conjecture is that the various movements reveal a little about the soul of their nations. The US tea party movement is unique — it is a small governement individual freedom movement. These core values are the key to US exceptionalism, and the reason I think the USA will fully recover from the financial crisis.

There’s a lot of crap being written about monetary policy at the moment. Take this from the FT, which says

Continue reading

I doubt the Democrats will extend the bush tax cuts if they get thumped in November. While long run consequences are likely to be unimportant, the short run consequences are worrying.

Scott Sumner at the money illusion blog has been writing some interesting stuff about negative rates and policy. I was

Continue reading

As i see it, the Fed is still unlikely to raise the funds rate this year or next – and

Continue reading

The revisions that came with the March IP report were significant, and it now looks to me that the US

Continue reading

The forecasts attached to the Fed’s Jan minutes are a little strange. They show a slight increase in the central

Continue reading

The risk of the USA slipping into deflation is a lot higher than most people think. Current headline and core

Continue reading

Though it is about preperation for a tightening, the discount rate increase is not tightening. I think it more likely that the fed will be buying more assets to prop up M2.

I’m feeling very bearish. Lots of bad things happened on Friday night. China tightened reserve requirements, the EU is on

Continue reading

Forget Hoenig, the Fed isn’t going to raise the funds rate in 2010, and is unlikely to do so in 2011 either. The Fed has a deflation fight to fight, and the battle looms closer than most think. I’m a buyer of TYH0 at friday’s night’s close (118*10, target 120, stop 119). risk reward is with longs – good data doesn’t prove europe is out of trouble, but bad data will make everyone quake.