economic bubbles

Understanding the Fed's Balance Sheet

Understanding the Fed's Balance Sheet

By Robert Aro

The Fed’s balance sheet could easily be replaced with the phrase abracadabra; truly, there is little else in the world which works as magically as it does. Often cited, seldom understood, few seem to realize that as the balance sheet expands, so too does the power of this central bank at the expense of the entire nation.

What If We Had A Gold Standard System, Right Now?

What If We Had A Gold Standard System, Right Now?

By Nathan Lewis

For most of the 182 years between 1789 and 1971, the United States embraced the principle of a dollar linked to gold — at first, at $20.67/oz., and then, after 1933, $35/oz. Nearly every economist today will tell you that was a terrible policy. We can tell it was a disaster because, during that time, the United States became the wealthiest and most prosperous country in the history of the world.

This is economist logic.

Trump’s Embrace of ‘Bubblenomics’ May be his Downfall

Trump’s Embrace of ‘Bubblenomics’ May be his Downfall

By Murray Sabrin

Two days after Donald Trump announced his candidacy in 2015 he told “Morning Joe” on MSNBC: “We have a big, fat bubble coming up, you watch. We have artificially induced low interest rates … I borrow money … You pay like nothing; they give you free money. Now that’s bad, that’s not good.”  

Despite sounding like a “hard-money” critic of the Federal Reserve as a presidential candidate, President Donald Trump has been reminding the American people in tweets and chats with the press in the Oval Office that the stock market has boomed during his presidency, and he really is a “low-interest person.”

Here is some background to Trump’s 180-degree pivot from Fed critic of easy money to Fed critic of “normalizing “interest rates.

The increase in short-term interest rates since late 2015 did not stifle the stock market’s climb to an all-time high in January 2018. After having a mild correction in the first quarter of 2018 the stock market, as measured by the S&P 500 index, rocketed to an all-time high in September 2018 at 2940.91.