Official statistics show that the coronavirus growth rate peaked a few days ago. Many hope this is a sign that the worst of the coronavirus is behind us. But more evidence is emerging that these statistics are not the measures of the virus growth, but rather the capacity of the Chinese health care system to deal with this problem.... Read More
Using cable news coverage as a gauge of concern/interest, we find little to no panic with the public over the virus. This suggests that little financial market downside has been discounted.... Read More
Below is our collection of coronavirus charts updated through Day 16 of reporting, January 31, 2020. First An Observation – A Hard Arithmetic Limit In Virus Growth? Many news reports suggest that the Chinese are limited in their health facilities... Read More
Bloomberg.com – Coronavirus May Drag China GDP Down to 4.5% in First Quarter Bloomberg Economics? model sees slowing from 6% last quarter Virus fallout could knock 0.1 point from U.S. and euro area China?s economy may grow just 4.5%... Read More
The growth in coronavirus infections has continued along a geometric progression for the last 12 days. While not overlooking the human tragedy, the markets have the difficult task of pricing an event that has a small chance of being devastating to global growth, but a more likely outcome of being contained.... Read More
On January 23, 2020, Jim spoke to the Chicago chapter of the CMT Association. Below is the slide deck from the speech: View PDF ... Read More
The Fed insists that their repo support operations are "not QE" and therefore are not influencing financial markets. 20 years ago the Fed did something similar and it seemed to have a profound effect on financial markets.... Read More
Summary With the election still roughly a year away, there is plenty of time for candidates’ odds to shift. In fact, a look at recent history shows only two candidates who led at this point in the process in previous... Read More
The Fed should be mapping out a plan to return the repo market to normal. Instead, their support of the market could reach $500B by year-end. Repo is too important to leave in this state for much longer.... Read More
On December 5, 2019, Jim spoke to the Fixed Income Analysts' Society of New York City.... Read More