Ideas and analysis on money, markets and the world around us.
This week an article in Euromoney points out that liquidity in bond markets is drying up. The blame is laid at the door of regulations designed to increase banks' capital relative to their balance sheets. Furthermore,…
Read the articleThe event of the week was the FOMC meeting on Wednesday, which actually said nothing of any substance. This was hardly surprising, given the impending change of chairmanship; however it triggered a rally in the US…
Read the articleOn Wednesday Finland gave in to public pressure and revealed where she stores her gold reserves. The statement followed a press release by the Bank of Sweden on similar lines released on Monday. The totals (in tonnes)…
Read the articleA number of people have asked me to expand on how the rapid expansion of money supply leads to an effect the opposite of that intended: a fall in economic activity. This effect starts early in the recovery phase of the…
Read the articlePrecious metals, led by gold, consolidated recent gains on Monday and Tuesday morning before moving ahead strongly late on Tuesday during Comex trading hours. Gold has now extended its rise from the recent intra-day low…
Read the articleChina is now overtly pushing for the US dollar to be replaced as the world's reserve currency. Xinhua, China's official press agency on Sunday ran an op-ed article which kicked off as follows: "As U.S. politicians of…
Read the articleThe news that dominated the week was the eleventh-hour decision by the Republican Party to back down from its game of chicken against the President over Obama-care, the budget and the debt ceiling. The debate now…
Read the articleThis week’s trading has been dominated by the budgetary and debt limit problems faced by the United States. On Monday and Tuesday gold gradually firmed to $1330, before drifting off to a low of $1282 on Thursday evening…
Read the articleWe are now into a second week of a partial Federal Government shut-down, which is causing considerable concern, centred on the Government’s ability to finance its debt and pay interest without a budget agreed for the…
Read the articleRecently the GoldMoney Foundation published an article proposing a new measure of money supply, the Fiat Money Quantity (FMQ), so that a direct comparison can be made between gold and currency, principally US dollars.…
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