Analysis Topic: Economic Trends Analysis
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Higher Wages or Bubblenomics: What's it gonna be? / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
By: Mike_Whitney
Wages, wages, wages. It all gets down to wages. A strong economy must be built on a solid foundation of steadily rising wages. If wages don't keep pace with production, the only way the economy can grow is through the expansion of debt, which leads to disaster.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
U.S. Economy GDP Contracts by 0.5% in Third Quarter / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
By: Money_Morning
Mike Caggeso writes: The U.S. economy shrank 0.5% in the third quarter, marking the slowing pace since 2001 and continuing a still deepening recession that has wrung the markets since last year.Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Inflation Deflation Switch Turns Entire Investment World Upside Down for 2009 / Economics / Investing 2009
By: Money_and_Markets
Martin Weiss writes: The Fed, the Treasury and all major governments on the planet are throwing the kitchen sink at this debt crisis.
But their efforts are being overwhelmed by a monumental sea change — the shift from rising prices to falling prices, from booming asset values to crashing asset values, from wealth creation to wealth destruction , from inflation to deflation.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Deflation Depression II as $10 Trillion Wealth Destroyed / Economics / Deflation
By: John_Mauldin
Have you done your Christmas shopping yet? Research shows that more of us are putting it off in expectations of better prices. In other words deflationary expectations! The prices I have seen while out shopping the past few weeks are simply amazing. I have to admit to have made a few purchases for some items that I was not planning to buy just yet because prices were off by 60% or more. A few days ago a friend came in sporting a new black cashmere sweater top with jeweled embroidery and quite fancy. She said she got it at Saks. But the real story is that when she walked into Saks looking for a present for her kids they handed her a coupon with a 30% off any one item from whatever price it was already marked down. That top? At one point it was almost $500. She bought it for $75. Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 22, 2008
Federal Reserve and Central Banking Responsible for Inflationary Booms and Busts / Economics / Global Financial System
By: Rob_Kirby
Whether Or Not We Like It - In the past, I've written papers where the following quotation was included at the end of the treatise as an “exclamation point”: “We shall have World Government, whether or not we like it. The only question is whether World Government will be achieved by conquest or consent.” – James Paul Warburg , whose family co-founded the Federal Reserve - while speaking before the United States Senate, February 17, 1950 Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 22, 2008
Great Depression 2009 Follows $30 Trillion Deflation / Economics / Economic Depression
By: Kurt_Kasun
Not Your Grandfather's Depression - It will be much worse, in many respects.
The chart below, borrowed from Dr. Marc Faber's Market Commentary December 1, 2008, is devastating. The chart shows a stunning loss of $30 trillion stock market wealth around the world. By some estimates, combined losses in commodities, stocks, bonds, real estate are greater than $60 trillion. This is beyond rescue.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 22, 2008
U.S. Economy Sinking in an Ocean of Newly Created Money / Economics / Fiat Currency
By: Gerard_Jackson
At one time or another we have all heard it said that "you cannot get there from here". Much the same can be said of the current state of the US economy. Every prominent economic pundit is focusing on falling demand as the economy's nemesis. Nouriel Roubini points out that "85 percent of aggregate demand -- consumption and fixed investment -- is now in free fall". It's even worse than that because final demand as it is calculated does not include inter-business spending (spending between the stages of production). If this were taken into account the picture would change from grim to downright scary. That Treasury bills have been trading at negative rates is evidence enough of the markets fearful state. Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Governments Powerless in the face of Price Deflation and Debt Collapse / Economics / Deflation
By: Money_and_Markets
Martin here with a quick update and big picture overview.
Deflation is now striking with unprecedented power and speed: Last week, OPEC announced its biggest production cut in history … and STILL oil prices collapsed, extending their largest decline of all time.
Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, December 19, 2008
Inflationary Consequences of Fed Policy of Monetary Panic / Economics / Money Supply
By: Ned_W_Schmidt
Measurement is perhaps second greatest problem in establishing satisfactory economic policies for a nation. That matters because those economic policies influence the value of the nation's money on foreign exchange markets. In the case of the U.S. dollar, that $Gold has risen in value by more than 150% in the past ten years is unquestionably a failing grade for U.S. economic policy makers. Inflation measurement may be part of that inadequacy as it was used as a rationale for easy money. Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 18, 2008
UK Inflation CPI Slumps to 4.1% Whilst RPI Crashes to 3% / Economics / Inflation
By: Nadeem_Walayat
UK inflation as measured by the CPI continued its sharp fall following Octobers slump from 5.2% to 4.5% by falling in November by 0.4% to 4.1%. This follows hard on the heels of the Bank of England's continuing panic interest rate cuts that saw another 1% sliced off of the UK base rate at Decembers MPC meeting to 2% as the UK remains on target to experience a recession just as bad as that of the early 1980's. Meanwhile the RPI inflation measure crashed by 1.2%, falling from 4.2% to 3% as increasingly the RPI measure heads for true deflation during 2009 i.e. negative inflation. Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 18, 2008
UK Unemployment Breaks above 2 million During December / Economics / UK Economy
By: Nadeem_Walayat
UK unemployment crept up by 39,000 for September to 1.864 million, and remains on target to break above 2 million on release of data for December 2008. The unemployment claimant count surged in November by nearly 10% to 1.056 million, up 86,000 on the month and confirming that the pace of unemployment is fast accelerating which compares against Octobers rise of 25,000 and September's rise of just 20,000. Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 18, 2008
UK Real Retail Sales Deflation Continues as Woolworths Goes Bust / Economics / UK Economy
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The latest retail sales data released by the ONS shows UK retail sales showing a surprise rose of 0.4 for November and up 1.7% on a year earlier, however a deeper analysis of the data reveals that the data for October was revised lower on the retail sales indices from 140 down to 139.7, and therefore the index of 140.1 for November is just 0.1 higher on the original data rather than that which the mainstream press is running with as positive sign as the below graph illustrates.Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Norway's Central Bank Slashes Rates, Warns of Recession / Economics / Euro-Zone
By: Victoria_Marklew
Norway's central bank today slashed its sight deposit rate by a record 175 bps, taking it to 3.0%. Stating that the risk of a "pronounced downturn" in the economy has increased, Norges Bank warned that real GDP is likely to contract in Q4 2008 and again in Q1 2009 - a marked contrast to its forecast of continued growth made just two months ago. Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 18, 2008
UK Economy Nosedives Pointing to Much Lower Sterling and Interest Rates / Economics / UK Economy
By: Victoria_Marklew
The economic news out of the UK is ever more grim. Today was the turn of employment and retail sales. Claimant count unemployment surged by 75,700 last month, taking the number of unemployed by this measure past the psychologically-important one million mark for the first time since 2001. The broader ILO-basis jobless rate rose from 5.8% in the three months to September, to 6.0% in August-October. As unemployment is usually a lagging indicator, the fact that jobs are being shed at this fast a pace this early in the economic downturn points to a harsh year ahead for employment. Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Financial World Turned Upside Down– A Changing of the Guard? / Economics / Credit Crisis 2008
By: William_R_Thomson
Revolutionary war history buffs may recall that as Lord Cornwallis surrendered to George Washington at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 his band – the Buckinghamshire Light Infantry - played “The world turned upside down”. Nothing could be a more apt metaphor for the global financial markets in the latter half of 2008. The established economic orthodoxies have been progressively jettisoned as the global markets entered an unprecedented phase of meltdown and fear drove out greed as the overriding driving force. Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Deflation and the Destruction of America's Wealth / Economics / Deflation
By: Money_and_Markets
Martin Weiss writes: The deflation we've been warning you about is here, and it's striking hard. Last week, the Fed released a report that sent chills down the spine of economists all over the world, revealing a sweeping destruction of wealth in America.
Just in the third quarter alone, U.S. households lost $647 billion in real estate; $922 billion in stocks; $523 billion in mutual funds; $653 billion in life insurance and pension fund reserves; plus $128 billion in private business interests.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Expect Smaller If Any Pay Increases During 2009 / Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010
By: Mike_Shedlock
The latest business survey from Hewitt Associates Inc. suggests that Pay Raises Will Take A Hit
Employers, who as recently as October said they were barely modifying their salary budgets for 2009, have changed their tune in December, this time bringing some workers' projected annual pay raises to a low not seen in three decades.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 15, 2008
Deflation 2009 as Central Bank Credit Creation Loses to Derivatives Deleveraging / Economics / Deflation
By: John_Mauldin
This week I am really delighted to be able to give you a condensed version of Gary Shilling's latest INSIGHT newsletter for your Outside the Box. Each month I really look forward to getting Gary's latest thoughts on the economy and investing. Last year in his forecast issue he suggested 13 investment ideas, all of which were profitable by the end of the year. It is not unusual for Gary to give us over 75 charts and tables in his monthly letters along with his commentary, which makes his thinking unusually clear and accessible.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 15, 2008
U.S. Federal Reserve Sets Stage for Weimar Style Hyper-inflation / Economics / HyperInflation
By: F_William_Engdahl
The Federal Reserve has bluntly refused a request by a major US financial news service to disclose the recipients of more than $2 trillion of emergency loans from US taxpayers and to reveal the assets the central bank is accepting as collateral. Their lawyers resorted to the bizarre argument that they did so to protect ‘trade secrets.' Is the secret that the US financial system is de facto bankrupt? The latest Fed move is further indication of the degree of panic and lack of clear strategy within the highest ranks of the US financial institutions. Unprecedented Federal Reserve expansion of the Monetary Base in recent weeks sets the stage for a future Weimar-style hyperinflation perhaps before 2010. Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, December 15, 2008
How Deflation Creates Hyper-inflation / Economics / HyperInflation
By: Eric_deCarbonnel
I keep reading about the dollar being a "new multi-year bull market" and that the US is headed for "Japan style deflation". Frankly, it is a little tiring. The people making these arguments should know better. Read full article... Read full article...