05/18/2017 - The World’s Central Banks Are Frozen With Fear
“2016 was supposed to be the year that the Federal Reserve ‘normalized’ its policies. As much as two years ago — after years of a near-zero target rate — the Fed was swearing that it would begin to raise rates back to ‘normal’ levels and cut its balance sheet. That never happened .. Looking at the central banks of Australia, the EU, Canada, Japan, China, and the UK, we find no tightening at all. Since 2012, with the exception of the Fed, it’s been nothing but cuts in the target rate. Excluding the Fed, the last time we saw central banks move was when the Australian central bank and the Bank of England lowered their target rates in August 2016. Meanwhile, the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan continue to sit in negative territory .. The cumulative effect of all of this is to drive home, yet again, that the central banks are simply too frozen with fear about the true state of the economy to take any hawkish action on interest rates .. the world’s central banks are driving home yet again that we’re in a race to the bottom. Yes, the US is in the midst of an inflationary regime, but the ECB, BOJ, and others appear to have no qualms about keeping their own money spigots wide open.”
https://mises.org/library/worlds-central-banks-are-frozen-fear
