The Wall Street Journal – Global Wheat Shortage Feared as Prices Surge In the developed world, the rising prices could pinch food makers, which may hesitate to push the cost to consumers. “It would likely take greater inflation for these food companies to pass these costs onto their customers,” said Andrew Lazar, a Barclays analyst.… Continue reading Wheat Prices Soar
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The current earnings season started July 12 with Alcoa’s release. While many understand that the current quarter’s earnings are somewhat gamed and therefore useless, company guidance is taken seriously. The current quarter’s guidance has received a lot of attention because of the sheer number of companies that are guiding earnings estimates higher. Many believe this… Continue reading Does Company Guidance LEAD the Economy?
The Wall Street Journal – Fed Mulls Symbolic Shift Federal Reserve officials will consider a modest but symbolically important change in the management of their massive securities portfolio when they meet next week to ponder an economy that seems to be losing momentum. The issue: Whether to use cash the Fed receives when its mortgage-bond… Continue reading Is QE2 About To Start?
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Treasuries Lack Safety, Liquidity for China, Yu Says U.S. Treasuries fail to provide safety or liquidity when it comes to managing China’s $2.45 trillion foreign-exchange reserves, said Yu Yongding, a former central bank adviser. “I do not think U.S. Treasuries are safe in the medium-and long-run,” Yu,… Continue reading China Worries About Treasuries
MarketBeat (WSJ Blog) – One Piece Of Puzzle In Dow Rebound Missing The Dow Jones Industrial Average has sent a couple of technical messages suggesting the market’s correction that began in late-April has just ended. There is still one piece of the market’s rally missing, however, before investors can get comfortable believing a new uptrend… Continue reading Technical Analysis
Real Time Economics (WSJ Blog) – Long Way to Go for Recovery This morning Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke noted that the economy still has a long way to go. The following charts illustrate his point.
The Wall Street Journal – Rewriting Fannie Mae History If you want proof that the Washington establishment has learned nothing from the 2008 financial panic, look no further than the nearby letter from former Fannie Mae CEO Franklin Raines. Our old antagonist is signaling where the debate is heading as Congress finally begins to consider… Continue reading Fannie Mae
TruthOut.org – Economists Tell the Masses: “It Could Have Been Worse” It is amazing that angry mobs have not risen up and chased all the economists out of the country. While the greed of the Wall Street gang provided the fuel for the bubble, the economists played an essential role as enablers. This was most… Continue reading Economists Under Attack
The Financial Times – Mohamed El-Erian: Uncertainty changing investment landscape Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke’s characterisation of the economic outlook as “unusually uncertain” has attracted much attention, and rightly so. It speaks to the immediate impact of a series of ongoing national and global realignments whose effects are consequential but not yet sufficiently appreciated…We can… Continue reading The New Normal
The New York Times – Paul Krugman: Why Is Deflation Bad? A number of readers have asked me to explain why deflation is a bad thing; and the truth is that while I’ve alluded to the issue a number of times, I’m not sure if I’ve ever laid out the whole case. So here goes.… Continue reading Krugman Speaks About Deflation