Global Crisis, National Renewal: A (Revolutionary) Grand Strategy for the United States
Blog
12/10/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Charles Hugh Smith on a Grand Strategy to address the Global Crisis
12/08/2021 - Yra Harris: It’s Hard to Believe
“If the G-7 nations would coordinate their policy decisions and the DOLLAR were to weaken, then the U.S. YIELD CURVE would probably reverse its recent FLATTENING action. Pay attention to currency levels. A critical currency outlier continues to be the Chinese yuan as it continues to rally in direct contravention to conventional wisdom: weak Chinese economy, weak currency. It is making a 40-month high Wednesday. Does this mean a further commodity rally as the CHINESE ECONOMY shifts to more domestic consumption? .. There was a Financial Times piece last week by Ruchir Sharma titled, “China is Faltering, but the World is not Feeling the Effects.” Sharma, a Morgan Stanley global strategist noted “exports have fallen as a share of China’s GDP from above 35 percent before 2010 to less than 20 percent today.”I s this the sea change in the global economy that Professor Michael Pettis has been discussing for many years? If so, what will the impact be on the world economy and especially will the disinflationary force of China’s one billion workers be felt through higher prices as the Chinese export less and consume more?”
12/07/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Shehzad Qazi on What the Data on China is Indicating
See also this related article – Link Here, based on the data from the China Beige Book:
“A paradigm shift has taken place in how Beijing approaches its economic priorities and management. Many China watchers have missed it because they are relying on a series of misperceptions and flawed forecasts based on China’s old growth playbook ..
With the Beijing Olympics in early 2022 and the critical 20th Party Congress following next fall, Beijing will almost certainly find it useful at some point to ease monetary conditions. But these will be political considerations based on a political calendar. For now, stimulus is less urgent, and medium-term growth will be far more subdued, than the Wall Street consensus is expecting. “
11/30/2021 - Alejandro Tagliavini – Las penas son de los pobres, los dólares son ajenos
” La violencia siempre destruye, ya lo sabía Aristóteles -y lo repitieron muchos como santo Tomás de Aquino- al que, obviamente, no leyeron en el Gobierno. Y no solo que no lo leyeron, sino que creen todo lo contrario, creen que los problemas de la violencia se solucionan con más violencia. Como dice Roberto Cachanosky “Un control lleva a otro, hasta que se termina ahogando por completo la actividad privada o el Gobierno termina hundiéndose en una catástrofe económica, social y política”.”
11/24/2021 - David Rosenberg on Inflation, Japan, Gold
“According to our models, valuations are much more compelling in Asia than they are in the United States. Thus, I like Asia over the U.S., particularly in the case of Japan. Japan is one of the most inexpensive stock markets in the world. And, with the recent victory of the Liberal Democratic Party, the political outlook has eliminated a source of uncertainty. What’s more, in the past few months, Japan has done a stellar job in getting their COVID case count down and their vaccination rates up. And of course, the recent cheapening of the Yen is a boon for their large cap exporters.
It is still very difficult to get a pulse of the Japanese consumer, but the business sector seems to be in very good shape. I think the industrials will perform well, especially with the upcoming fiscal stimulus and the weakening of the Yen. So large cap exporters will probably benefit the most.
If you’re looking for a hard asset that is unloved and underowned, gold and gold mining stocks will be a very good place to be. Very recently, gold has been firming despite a strong U.S. dollar. If I’m right with my forecast and the dollar depreciates next year and real interest rates stay negative, this will be a very important tailwind for gold. There’s also the prospect that China continues to embark on its regulatory crackdown on crypto currencies, which should also be a positive for gold. Finally, you see it on a technical basis: Gold has been breaking out.”
11/23/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Jim Bianco and Yra Harris on the Economy and the Financial Markets – LIVE recording
11/22/2021 - Yra Harris – Odious, Indeed
“The main concern for the world is not TRADE but the massive amount of DOLLAR-DENOMINATED DEBT. In the last decade, global debt has grown to $330 trillion from $200 trillion, according to IMF, BIS and IIF. The dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency means a large percentage of the DEBT is denominated in U.S. currency, especially because the Fed’s aggressive QE policy has sustained very low interest rates to enable DOLLAR funding for many emerging market businesses.
Many emerging market central banks have begun raising rates to keep their currencies attractive so as not to create stress for their private sector dollar borrowers. But how high can rates go in Brazil, Mexico, Russia and others before their economies begin to slow?
The Europeans need to be more concerned about its policy of LOWER FOR LONGER sending the DOLLAR to levels that cause global systemic stress in the DEBT markets. Lagarde is pursuing a one-dimensional goal in a multi-faceted world. While some may not think this is ODIOUS it will prove to be reprehensible. Market signaling mechanisms are broken in the face of massive QE purchases so there are no market forces to upset the ECB agenda, or the BOJ’s. The FED is going it alone … maybe. Perhaps it’s time for a G-7 meeting?”
11/16/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Kevin Duffy and Yra Harris on Key Investment Themes
11/16/2021 - Live Podcast on Nov 23 – Jim Bianco and Yra Harris
11/16/2021 - Alejandro Tagliavini – La nueva moda global, la estanflación
” ‘Estanflación’, estancamiento con “inflación” -suba del IPC, en rigor-, es un término acuñado por un político británico, Iain Macleod, en 1965, cuando muchos economistas dudaban de que una economía con poco o ningún crecimiento y tasas de “inflación” más altas de lo normal fuera posible, según cuenta Laura Sánchez de Investing.com. La peor estanflación que se recuerda en EE.UU. ocurrió durante la década de 1970.”
11/15/2021 - Yra Harris: A Possible Solution to the Central Bank Dilemma
“THE GOLD/CURRENCY SPREADS DISCUSSED IN THIS BLOG HAVE BEEN A MARKET RESPONSE TO THE LOOMING CREDIBILITY GAP OF ALL CENTRAL BANKS IN A FIAT CURRENCY WORLD. Listening to the recent speeches from ECB and FED members there still seems to be a race to be the greatest liquidity provider in a QE-dominated world. The move to buy the precious metals in the face of rising short-term interest rates is a response to concerns that the CENTRAL BANKS HAVE NO ANSWERS TO THE TRAP OF FORWARD GUIDANCE AND ITS MANTRA OF LOWER FOR LONGER.”
11/09/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Judd Hirschberg on Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets
11/08/2021 - Yra Harris: What Turned the Markets On Friday?
“If my conjecture is correct get prepared for increased volatility, especially in the U.S. DOLLAR and precious metals, but be patient as this story will unfold in the wake of Congress finally passing an infrastructure bill.”
11/04/2021 - Alejandro Tagliavini on Elon Musk and The Natural Market
“As I have explained in previous notes, succinctly, today there are three economic theories. Keysianism, which we know for being a great setter of bubbles, print and print money bills believing that this is how they move the economy and what they achieve is an artificial balloon that when explodes destroys more than what eventually achieved. Then, the neoclassical economic theory -the preferred one of market operators who distrust exaggerated issuance- whose characteristic consists in believing in the equilibrium -of the supply and demand curve- of the market, which implies that perfect knowledge has been reached and, therefore, that it is static and rigid: the company is only a productive function, a means to transform inputs into products.
nd, finally, the theory of the natural market (“free” from artificial State interference), initiated by the Spanish scholastics of the School of Salamanca of the 15th and 16th centuries, and taken up, to some extent, by the Austrian School of Economy that knows that there is no equilibrium -because there is no perfect, static knowledge- but a specific environment in permanent movement, which tends towards equilibrium at the rate at which market players find new knowledge that is always perfectible and pose new horizons that move the point of balance.”
11/01/2021 - Yra Harris: The Odious Designs of ECB Policy
“The coordination of central bank policies for the last decade is what is truly ODIOUS but its continuation provides trading and investment opportunities. Our job is to find those and put the lowest risk strategies to work. Now onto the FOMC meeting this week.”
10/29/2021 - Dr. Albert Friedberg on Inflation and Commodities – Quarterly Podcast
10/26/2021 - The Roundtable Insight – Peter Boockvar and Yra Harris on Inflation, Currencies, Interest Rates and Commodities
10/25/2021 - Marc Faber on the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Dollar
10/19/2021 - The Roundtable Insight: Democracy, Economics and Entrepreneurship in the Future of Spain and Latin America
10/18/2021 - Yra Harris: Shedding Some Light
“The FED wants to proclaim how noble its efforts have been but the DEBT created in its name have not had its day of reckoning. Maybe, that is why inflation is deemed to be the best cure to the massive problem providing a SPECTRE that haunts the world. This will be a theme for the fourth quarter here at NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND.”
