March 17, 2023 What a difference a week makes! On Tuesday and Wednesday of last week, Fed Chair Jay Powell stepped out onto his financial tightrope in front of Congress and tried to placate both Wall Street (zero-interest rate fans) and Main Street (low inflation fans). He was performing a balancing act, caught between the …
March 10, 2023 Years back there was a famous tightrope walking family known as The Flying Wallendas. Led by patriarch Karl Wallenda they performed breathtaking feats of daring. I don’t need to tell you, traversing a highwire 40, 50 or even 100-plus feet in the air is a dangerous business. One misstep can lead to …
February 24, 2023 Let’s do a quick side-by-side comparison of how the economy is doing. Here’s the government’s version… Back on Valentine’s day, the chair of the US Council of Economic Advisors, Cecilia Rouse, penned a valentine op-ed to her boss Joe Biden. In this political-economic love note, she spouted some of the most fawning …
February 17, 2023 Well we’re a month and a half into the new year and things on the economic front are looking pretty good — that’s if you’re listening to the reports that the government economic types have been putting out. Inflation is in retreat, said Fed Chair Jay Powell at his last FOMC media …
3 Million Reasons to NOT Trust Employment Numbers Read More »
February 10, 2023 But First… A Small Victory for Microsoft In case you missed it: I guess it does matter where you get your news… In your last weekly update I wrote about Microsoft’s big gamble — their $10 billion bet on the AI upstart OpenAI and its new wiz-app ChatGPT. They plan to integrate …
January 27, 2023 Earnings season is back! And everyone is on the edge of their seats waiting to see whether a widespread earnings recession is finally starting to set in. Most of the companies I’ve been watching have been pulling their guidance in, as many have expected. But they’re not falling off a cliff. Frankly, …
January 20, 2023 Theater season opened this week with two blockbuster shows kicking off the program. If there’s one thing the high and mighty love, it’s a good show. Unfortunately not all political theater ends with the same happy (or at least tidy) endings as most Broadway productions do. The two shows opening the 2023 …
January 13, 2023 Sometimes I feel like I’m a little unfair to the Fed… I make them seem like the Keystone Cops of monetary policy. Truth is, their job is hard. I talk about how they use “Fed-speak” — the ability to spew a lot of words without really saying anything — to address economic …
December 16, 2022… It was an incredible report! One that should be cause to celebrate. Certainly it should reinforce the stellar and successful work being done by the Federal Reserve and the Biden administration to manage our economy. Annual inflation FELL 0.6%! Don’t believe me? Check the math for yourself… The annual inflation rate for …
Peak Inflation? How Inflation Reports Intentionally Mislead You… Read More »
December 9, 2022… Twenty-six thousand feet up Mt. Everest, just 3,000 feet from the literal top of the world, amid the harshest, most unforgiving conditions on earth, is the area known as the “death zone.” Living in the mountains myself, I can tell you going up 6,500 feet can take some adjusting to if you’re …
Suffocating Economies and Zombie Consumers: The Dire Effects of This Dwindling Resource Read More »
