Summer Reflections

August is a wonderful month for reflection. For me it is always a time with very few client meetings, conferences or speaking engagements. And most importantly, it offers a welcome break from airports, hotels, taxis and suitcases. Of course the markets do not always...

Does anyone remember the great commodity crash of 1951?

Earlier this week I wrote a note entitled "What do deflationists and the Fed staff have in common?". And as usual I got some very thoughtful client responses. The one reprinted below comes from a very bright gentleman in Italy. He got me thinking about the post 1951...

What do deflationists and the Fed staff have in common?

Last week's note entitled "European bailouts, gold crashes, rate tantrums" generated a fair amount of controversy. Many folks pointed out that the recent abrupt drop in neary all major commodity prices meant that the current situation was not, as I suggested, readily...

What now?

While this may sound strange, I believe European risk assets would have ended at higher levels last week had Greece left the Eurozone. Of course there would have been an ugly initial dip, but the market would have quickly realized that an exit (or timeout) was NOT...

An interesting response from the Buckeye State

When I send out a commentary I generally receive quite a lot of “feedback”. Often I get hundreds of responses, and I wish I could say I read everything - but that would be disingenuous. I do however try to open most of the emails and have at least a quick glance. And...

Laissez-faire Marxism

If we step back for a moment and take stock of the entire Greek situation it is pretty amazing. The Greek parliament is actually about to agree to sweeping tax reforms, pension reforms, labor market reforms and privatizations. And the leader of this great charge for...