history

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's lecture series at George Washington University is most unfortunate. The first instinct, at least here, is to let it pass. Two of the man's characteristics will be addressed in what follows. First, his…

Rich nations worldwide have a problem with debt. In the past, such problems have been dealt with by several tactics, including “financial repression”. This column explains how the tactic works and documents its resurgence in the wake of the…

We received a phone call over the weekend from a close friend and someone who reads our comments religiously. He had a question for us. He wanted to know if we were still in the secular bear market camp or have we thrown in the towel since…

This daily commentary is a bronze-level post for Pro subscribers. Two articles worth reading on the 2004 change in net capital rules for investment banks are highlighted in today's links.

Kondratieff waves are these supercycles that a lot of people have been talking about in the context of the great leveraging that led to crisis in developed economies. We appear to be at the end of one of these waves in bond markets…

The enduring global crisis is giving rise to fears that economic hard times will feed political extremism, as it did in the 1930s. This column suggests that the danger of political polarisation and extremism is greatest in countries with…

This was the question put to the ECB's Klaus Masuch by one persistent Irish journalist. The answer from Masuch was a complete dodge, a non-answer, because everyone knows that the Irish government has heaped what rightfully should be…

The financial plan is basically an asset grab. They want to load the whole economy down with debt. A consumer will come in and say, I’d like to take out a loan. They’ll say, how much do you earn? Everything over subsistence they’ll want as…

The promises of reform at Foxconn are the latest of many as China painfully adjusts to the inevitable social realignment that comes with a capitalist economy. What is occurring in China now happened in Europe during the transition from…

Great chart from the recently released Economic Report of the President. We suspect the Great Depression housing bust didn’t have the government props to soften the blow as we do today, which, therefore, on a relative basis, makes the…