<Click on image for interactive graphic> BBC News – What could happen next if Greece leaves the eurozone? There is more and more speculation that Greece is about to leave the euro. The country has been unable to form a government, and new elections seem set to give power to parties that reject the spending… Continue reading What If Greece Leaves The Euro?
The Financial Times – Martin Wolf: A fragile Europe must change fast I sympathise with the Germans. This is not because I agree with their prevailing view of how the crisis occurred or what to do about it. I sympathise because the German elite were the ones who understood what creating the euro implied. They… Continue reading Europe
Sober Look (Blog) – IG CDX diverges from S&P500; JPMorgan advocates mean reversion trade As discussed a few days back, the Investment Grade (IG) CDX has underperformed High Yield (HY) CDX since the announcement of JPMorgan’s recent loss. On a relative basis, investment grade CDX widened faster than HY. That underperformance is also visible when… Continue reading More On J.P. Morgan
<Click on chart for larger image> Zero Hedge – ETA To NEW QE: Don’t Hold Your Breath Just Yet Whether one believes that Bernanke’s mandate mission in life is to ‘save the banking system’, ‘reflate asset prices’, ‘devalue the USD’ – all of which seem to err on the side of inflation (and ultimately hyper-inflation… Continue reading QE3 Watch
The New York Times – The Growing Fed One part of the economy that’s growing rapidly is the Federal Reserve. These are boom times for the central bank, which persuaded Congress to expand its responsibilities significantly in the wake of the financial crisis. And with greater responsibility comes a larger budget. If not in every… Continue reading The Federal Reserve’s Budget
CBO.gov – Economic Effects of Reducing the Fiscal Restraint That Is Scheduled to Occur in 2013 Policymakers are facing difficult trade-offs in formulating the nation’s fiscal policies. On the one hand, if the fiscal policies currently in place are continued in coming years, the revenues collected by the federal government will fall far short of… Continue reading The Fiscal Cliff
Real Time Economics – Number of the Week: Student Loan Bubble 368%: The jump since 2007 in the measure of consumer credit held by the government comprised primarily of student loans. If a student loan bubble were to pop, the government, not private banks, would be the one standing around with gum in its hair.… Continue reading Student Loans
Washington Wire (WSJ Blog) – WSJ Poll: Dim Views of Big Business, Government Voters have little confidence in Wall Street, large corporations or the news media, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. The poll, which will be released in full at 6:30 p.m. ET Tuesday, asked voters to describe their level of… Continue reading Voters And Big Business
Bloomberg.com – Unemployed Burn as Fed Fiddles in Debate Over Natural Rate: Jobs Federal Reserve officials and economic advisers are debating far-reaching differences on whether to accept a jobless rate that doesn’t fall much below 6.5 percent or act more aggressively to reduce it to 5 percent or less. David Horowitz says he’s “not enough… Continue reading U.S. Unemployment
The Wall Street Journal – Nasdaq: Hindsight Says to Delay IPO A senior Nasdaq Stock Market executive told customers that the exchange would have put the brakes on Facebook Inc.’s FB -8.90%initial public offering had it known the extent of the technical problems that would plague its systems and disrupt the eagerly anticipated listing. Meanwhile,… Continue reading The Facebook IPO Blunder
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<Click on image to view interview> Comment Jim Bianco was interview by Consuelo Mack on her show WealthTrack last week. He covered a range of topics including consumer credit, Europe and inflation. To view the interview click on the image above. To view any of our recent interviews click here.