Why The Fed Would Be Insane To Raise Rates: The Rising U.S. Dollar
The USD strengthening since last July is the core driver of the global recession.
The parlor game of the moment is laying odds on the Federal Reserve's decision to raise rates, leave rates unchanged, or (gasp!) hint at future stimulus. There are certainly a multitude of inputs to the Fed's decision, and a variety of potential consequences, but only one really matters: the effect on foreign exchange/currency markets.
It's not that difficult to understand the one dynamic that matters. If the Fed raise yields/interest rates in the U.S., that makes the U.S. currency, i.e. the U.S. dollar (USD), more attractive.
Higher yield = more attractive, especially when coupled with the liquid market for U.S. Treasuries and the relative safety of the dollar vis a vis other currencies issued by falling-into-recession nations and trading blocs.
Jim Simons was a mathematician and cryptographer who realized: the complex math he used to break codes could help explain patterns in the world of finance. Billions later, he’s working to support the next generation of math teachers and scholars. TED’s Chris Anderson sits down with Simons to talk about his extraordinary life in numbers.
The AP reports that some driver advocates like the Center for Auto Safety were concerned that this pledge doesn’t do enough to get automatic breaking systems into cars. Those advocates would rather the government legally require cars to have automatic breaking systems, instead of rely on a voluntary promise to keep drivers safe. Another concern is that automatic braking systems are generally sold as add-ons to luxury vehicles, which would put them out of reach of most consumers
Credit default swaps are contracts that let investors buy protection to hedge against the risk that corporate or sovereign debt issuers will not meet their payment obligations.
The market peaked at $58 trillion in 2007, according to the Bank for International Settlements, but shrank to $16 trillion seven years later as investors better understood its risks
One often wonders why governments indebt themselves for so much more than they can ever hope to pay… Here, Western economists, bankers, traders, Ivy League academics and professors, Nobel laureates and the mainstream media have a quick and monolithic reply: because all nations need “investment and investors” if they wish to build highways, power plants, schools, airports, hospitals, raise armies, service infrastructures and a long list of et ceteras, economic and national activities are all about.
This ranking sorts 61 countries by price, earnings needed to buy a gallon, and annual income spent on fuel.
BRASÍLIA — The president of Brazil should have been ecstatic. She had just won re-election after an intense campaign in which she fiercely defended her role in making Brazil, for a few fleeting years, a rising star on the global stage.
But in the days after her victory last October, President Dilma Rousseff was worried, confronted in private deliberations with her closest advisers by signs that Brazil’s triumphs were at risk of coming undone.
“We went too far,” Aloízio Mercadante, Ms. Rousseff’s chief of staff, acknowledged publicly this month, describing the sense of alarm as the dust settled after the election and Ms. Rousseff and her aides grappled with the weaknesses in Brazil’s economy.
A Passing Thought...
