United States

I want to pick up where I left off yesterday and highlight the growth dichotomy between Euroland on the one hand and the U.S. and the U.K. on the other. Yesterday I wrote that the risk is to the upside in the U.S. (and the U.K.) if…

The latest data out of Europe shows the economy in the euro zone continuing to expand and suggests that we are probably in a technical recovery. In Europe, however, the threat to recovery is to the downside, whereas in the U.S. the main…

The US is now on track to reach only 1.6% real GDP growth for 2013 - in spite of the extraordinary amount of central bank stimulus. The sad part about this weakness is that to some extent it has been self-inflicted. Policy uncertainty,…

The U.S. Treasury’s semi-annual currency report had surprisingly strong criticism for Germany. The U.S. claims that Germany’s macroeconomic policies are inherently deflationary, creating risk for further crisis. I agree with this criticism…

Newman: "in my own book the explanation starts the cycle with government spending, thus adding to the money supply, and then issuing treasuries for roughly equivalent amount. The bond vigilantes really have it backwards.

It is not US fundamentals, but global fundamentals that will determine the Fed's ability to taper. If the Fed tapers when the global economy is already in the doldrums, as it is at the moment, the recessionary rebound to the US economy…

During the government shutdown, the data for a variety of economic reports were halted. Therefore, I looked at alternative, private sector, data to estimate the government reports. One such model used the historical differential between…

Fama has been doing research on QE for the last six months. And he basically tells Santelli that QE in the Treasury market is an asset swap of short-term government debt for long-term debt. Fama’s depiction of QE is accurate and mirrors…

The PMI survey shows the first fall in manufacturing output in the US since September 2009. Eurozone PMIs are moving in the other direction.

I believe policy makers at the the Federal Reserve have soured on the marginal effectiveness of quantitative easing as a primary tool for monetary policy. As interest rate policy is still not effective with the policy rate at zero, forward…