Greece Says It Will Make IMF Payment Next Week As Stalemate Continues
Greece may succeed in avoiding a default next week, but it remains at loggerheads with its creditors.
Read more...Category Archives: Economic fundamentals
The Foreclosure Crisis Caused a Great Migration in Miniature
Several commentators picked up on the relationship between the events in Baltimore and the dearth of economic opportunity that leads to a sense of hopelessness. But precious few added the component of the foreclosure crisis, a dislocating event that has few parallels in American history. A new paper in the American Sociological Review by Matthew Hall (Cornell), Kyle Crowder (University of Washington) and Amy Spring (Georgia State) puts numbers to this, and shows that we really had a small-scale version of the Great Migration, the shift of African-Americans from the rural south to the big cities of the north. This migration hollowed out and segregated African-American and Latino communities to an even greater degree than where they already were.
Read more...Wolf Richter: “Smart Money” Prepares to Profit from Bond Market Rout
“If I had an easy way and a non-risk way of shorting a whole lot of 20- or 30-year bonds, I’d do it,” said our favorite uncle Warren Buffett on CNBC. These kinds of bonds have been on a terrific bull run ever since Paul Volker, as Chairman of the Fed, cracked down on inflation. But now, even the avuncular face of capitalism would bet against them.
Read more...The Persecution and Assassination of the People of Greece as Performed by the Inmates of the Troika, Under the Direction of the Eurogroup
A new paper shreds the myths that justified the misguided application of austerity and wage-rate reduction policies in Greece and the Eurozone.
Read more...Wolf Richter: China Containerized Freight Index Plunges to Multi-Year Low, Shanghai-EU Rates Totally Collapse, US Rates Morose
Weak demand in the Eurozone; inventory build-up in the U.S., and free money meant carriers added more and more ships. How does the movie end?
Read more...Syriza Emulates Nixon Going to China in a Bad Way
It’s painful to watch the Greek ruling coalition unwittingly do the creditors’ work by wringing Greece dry of cash more aggressively than Pasok or New Democracy would have dared to.
Read more...Ilargi: Sucking Spoilt Milk From A Bloated Dead Sow
Ilargi describes why the US is not a democracy, it is not the supreme leader of the world, and the American economy is not in recovery.
Read more...How Much Did Your Economy Suffer in the First Quarter?
We poll members of the commentariat for readings on the state of their local economy.
Read more...How Shale Is Becoming The Dot-Com Bubble Of The 21st Century
The parallels of the dot com era with the shale boom are simply stunning as most E&P companies need to spend well over their operational cash flow.
Read more...Ridiculing Concerns About TPP Tyranny
Yes, Virginia, the TPP is at least as bad as its critics say it is.
Read more...Witnessing A Fundamental Change In The Oil Sector
The U.S. oil production decline has begun.
Read more...Wolf Richter: Manufacturing Falls Apart in the Middle of the US
Key manufacturing indexes in the heartlands are flashing red.
Read more...The 23 Count Indictment of the TPP
This post will serve to remind you: call your Representative (contact info here) and Senators (contact info here) today and tell them in no uncertain terms that you expect them to vote against Fast Track authority.
Read more...Satyajit Das: Two Views of Japan’s Setting Sun
Das discusses two recent books on Japan, and both provide windows on how Japan is coping with its now lost two decades. One of them is by Tag Murphy, who I met in my days in Japan and has long been a very insightful commentator. As I said at the Atlantic Economy conference, rather than trying to “jump start the economy,” which would take more radical restructuring than they are willing to engage in, the top wealthy might be better served to worry about managing low growth better. And for its many flaws, egalitarian Japan has muddled through a far more severe bubble and bust with more grace than we have.
Read more...Eurogroup Demands Varoufakis’ Ouster; Trajectory Toward Default Continues
In case you had any doubts that Greece is supposed to act like a good debt vassal, the Eurogroup’s hissy fit over Yanis Varoufakis at last Friday’s meeting, which stoked a raft of unflattering articles, has now led it to demand to that Greek government remove him.
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