fake recovery

Predicting the future of policy making has been and will continue to be key to understanding where this economy is headed – and by extension what your investment portfolio will do.

This is going to be a relatively long post. But I think it’s important. I have been meaning to update my thinking about the “Fake Recovery” which I heralded in early 2009 as the economy in the US began to turn. My view is that without…

I want to take you through how we got from the financial system's "systemic insolvency" to bailouts to record profits and bonuses again in the span of two years. From the WikiLeaks cables as published in the Guardian today…

Peter Cecchini, chief strategist at BGC Financial, talks to Pimm Fox about the U.S. economy and consumer credit on Bloomberg Television's "Taking Stock." He says that the 122% percent household debt to GDP ratio is well above the…

I am starting a new list of articles on my reading list which point to the success of what Marshall Auerback calls "The Committee to Save Wall Street," with this Newsweek cover as a contrarian indicator. The point is that the…

Wolfgang Munchau of the Financial Times wrote a very important comment piece in today’s Financial Times. In it he said that central banks are targeting asset prices to avoid the brunt of cyclical downturns. This policy is inducing asset…

For the last few months I have been casting around looking for bullish data points as counterfactuals to my more bearish long-term outlook. I have found some, but not enough. If you recall, early this year, I stated that we are in…

Back in April I told you I anticipated an uptick in GDP in part because of changes in inventories - massive change in the inventories. At the time, I thought I was going out on a limb by suggesting we could see positive GDP numbers in Q3…

This September 2009 post still describes my general view on the U.S. economy. If I wrote it today, I would be more bearish medium-term because it is obvious that in 2010 fiscal and monetary policy will become less supportive of recovery.…

Right now many economists believe the US economy is poised for recovery.  Even I believe the economy will recover by year’s end. But for the man in the street, things hardly look like a recovery right now. Harried by falling house…