NGE deflation, the Euro death march and refi.gov

As I arrived at my hotel in Madrid late last night, there was a banner hanging above the entry. It said "The hotel staff will be on strike tomorrow for the first time in over 100 years. Not even during the Spanish Civil War did the hotel staff miss a day at work". It...

Another Treasury Buying Metaphor

I have a couple more days in Europe before I head to the West coast. I have had some amazing discussions with clients on Europe, the US and China. The diversity of views is staggering and it’s clear that those in the "optimistic" camp have been very frustrated by the...

Imagine if the Defense Department acted like the Fed

Suppose the Department of Defense had a mission – to take out the government of a rogue nation. For the purposes of this discussion we will call this nation Deflationstan. However, rather than go in with the full forces of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines, the...

Quick FOMC thoughts

Reading the statement from a cab in London, it appears 3 big changes. First, the inflation paragraph is much more dovish with the addition of a statement on inflation being below the level consistent with the mandate on price stability. Second, the final paragraph...

Brilliant Japanese Policymaking

The fallout from Japanese intervention continues to be the primary driver of almost all price action. First of all positioning long YEN and CHF in much of the CTA world has created a lot of wound licking. I suspect speculative positions that were largely in “risk off”...

You aint gonna beggar this neighbor….

The geopolitical fallout from the Japanese intervention has yet to work itself through market psyche yet. The Japanese unilateral move to defend the YEN represents is a HUGE sea change for global capital markets. First and foremost the Chinese foray into YEN purchases...