The Wall Street Journal – How Crisis Strengthens Europe’s Bonds Markets are in a constant state of flux. But they are also driven by long-term structural forces that end up producing lasting change. In Europe, the corporate bond market has been undergoing a quiet revolution ever since the global financial crisis hit. The big switch… Continue reading Europe’s Corporate Bond Market
The Financial Times – Capitalism: In search of balance While the income gap in industrialised societies grows inexorably wider, global inequality is shrinking “While the earnings of a minority are growing exponentially, so too is the gap separating the majority from the prosperity enjoyed by the happy few. This imbalance is the result of ideologies… Continue reading Global Income Inequality Is Shrinking
Bloomberg.com – U.S. Store Traffic Sinks 21% as Last-Ditch Deals Flop Fewer Americans hit the malls the last week before Christmas even as retailers from Macy’s Inc. to Michael Kors Holdings Ltd. poured on the discounts. U.S. store visits plummeted 21 percent and retail sales dropped 3.1 percent in the week through Saturday, signaling a… Continue reading Holiday Shopping
The Wall Street Journal – Big Rally to Pump Up Wall Street Bonuses A strong rally in financial markets over the past two months is expected to add a last-minute boost to bonus packages for Wall Street’s traders and investment bankers, partially offsetting an otherwise grim year. The winners in financial firms this year are… Continue reading Bonuses On Wall Street Expected To Rise
The Wall Street Journal – Stock Investors Bask in Merry Glow Economic indicators, especially in the U.S., are showing steady improvement as the global economy continues to mend the damage wrought by the 2008 financial crisis. Profit growth may be slow, but without a recession on the horizon, investors say that isn’t enough of reason… Continue reading Santa Claus Rally In Stocks
Charts of the Week This week we assembled a collection of over 70 of our favorite long-term charts. Please enjoy. Topics Covered This Week Include: Long Term Interest Rates Back To 1790 Short Term Interest Rates Back to 1831 Long Term and Short Term Interest Rates Back to 1831 “Real” Long Term Interest Rates Back… Continue reading Charts of the Week
Financial Stability vs Data Dependency: Why Did The Fed Start The Taper? A transcript of the December 19, 2013 conference call. Audio Link of Conference Call Handout (also shown below) [hana-flv-player video=”https://www.biancoresearch.com/bianco/SubscriberArea/121913.flv” width=”600″ height=”495″ description=”” player=”3″ autoload=”false” autoplay=”false” loop=”false” autorewind=”true” splashimage=”https://www.biancoresearch.com/bianco/wp-content/themes/twentyten/images/splash.jpg” /] <Click above to view webcast> [pageview url=”https://www.biancoresearch.com/bianco/wp-content/plugins/PDFViewer/plugin.php?id=165″] Audio [audio:https://www.biancoresearch.com/bianco/SubscriberArea/121913.mp3|titles=Conference Call ]
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Hedge Funds Cut Gold Bull Bets Amid Record Outflows: Commodities Hedge funds got less bullish on gold before prices dropped to the lowest level since 2010, leaving the metal poised for the worst annual loss in 32 years as investors dump bullion at a record pace. Money… Continue reading Everyone Hates Gold
Real Time Economics (WSJ Blog) – How to Measure Corporate America’s Huge Profits Corporate profits have been soaring during the recovery, by one measure sitting at their largest share of the U.S. economy since World War II. Buried inside Friday’s economic data, the government gives us ten ways to show how well corporate America is… Continue reading How To Measure Corporate Profits
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – China Cash Crunch Pushes Up Short-Term Rates Central Bank Facing Difficulty Managing Financial System A cash crunch in China pushed short-term interest rates to a new recent high Monday and highlighted the difficulties faced by the central bank in managing an increasingly complex and… Continue reading China Funding Crisis Worsens, But Don’t Say It!
FuW – Christoph Gisiger: We live in a hall of mirrors The sharply thinking Wall Street veteran doesn’t trust the theoretical models of the central banks and warns of irrational exuberance in the financial markets. rom the United States to Europe and Asia: The world all over central banks are flooding markets with liquidity and… Continue reading The Fed’s Models Don’t Work