trade

Our hearts go out to the Japanese because of the human tragedy that resulted from a devastating earthquake and tidal wave. I want to echo Dr. El-Erian's sentiments here. It will difficult and it will have globe-spanning consequences, but…

By Michael Pettis Barry Eichengreen had a very interesting piece in last week’s Wall Street Journal. In it he argues that we are approaching the end of the period in which the US dollar is the world’s dominant reserve currency, and…

China threw in a surprise trade deficit number this past month. However, It looks to be a one off. UBS' Andy Lees in London explains: The February trade numbers slipped to a deficit of USD7.3bn. The number is usually volatile at this…

By Marc Chandler The yen is largely sidelined as the market's focus is elsewhere--ECB policy trajectory, the European debt crisis, MENA, etc. This is reflected by the fact that dollar-yen volatility (implied 3-month) is sitting on its…

I don't think people realize that the Chinese have just made a rather sizable shift in economic policy. The Chinese are moving on multiple fronts now toward a new economic paradigm that includes slower growth but more domestic consumption.…

We have found that the correlation between oil and the Canadian dollar has collapsed. We conduct the correlation analysis on a 60-day rolling basis, using percent change. The correlation peaked at the end of last year near 0.76. It now…

U.S. exports of sea containers are up 13% YoY. Imports too are up 13% YoY. This is indicating a growing trade balance deficit, since exports exceed imports.

When multiplier relationships are recognized, the conclusion is that the U.S. did not have enough population to produce what it has been consuming.

Overall, we should credit Germany for building a recovery based not just on exports, but on capital investment and saving. One reason that Germany is a manufacturing and export powerhouse is because it has invested in those businesses.…

In January Steven Hansen observed that, through November, the trade deficit for manufactured goods in 2010 was the equivalent of 1.3 million workers earning the median manufacturing wage in the U.S.