Thanks to Andrew Pohl for this comment this morning: Dear Michael, I attended your presentation to the CFA [Chartered Financial Analyst] society back in 2012 and I wanted to write you and thank you again for your speech. While it was a while ago, I still think of you and [continue reading . . . ]
Friday’s jobs report showed the U.S. headline unemployment rate has fallen to 5.4%, the lowest since mid-2008. Good for us, but hold the applause. The underemployment rate, including those working part time involuntarily, remains relatively high (10.8%) for this stage of the recovery. It has been nearly six years since [continue reading . . . ]
Why are interest rates so low? The best answer, says Martin Wolf, principal economics columnist of the Financial Times, is that the globe’s advanced economies remain in a “managed depression.” This is the phenomenon that former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers has in mind when he writes and speaks about [continue reading . . . ]
Is China done? Is the 66-year-old dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) about to end? “Predicting the demise of authoritarian regimes is a risky business,” writes old China hand Dr. David Shambaugh in a not-to-be-missed essay (subscription required, or use your library card) in the Wall Street Journal March [continue reading . . . ]
Listen to the music of the bond market. That was the first of the bullet points that I presented to speaking clients last week. The song the global bond market is singing this week is the same as last week: Almost No Inflation, and Very Little Growth. Germany on February [continue reading . . . ]
Overview bullet points ahead of my economic-update presentations last week to the Northwest Wall & Ceiling Bureau (slides here), a trade association, and the Economic Development Association of Skagit County (slides), perhaps Washington’s most successful economic development association: Listen to the music of the global bond markets. The tune they [continue reading . . . ]
The economy of the Seattle area seems as strong as it has been in my 40 years covering the economy as a financial journalist. Amazon’s voracious demand for office space is remaking downtown Seattle and South Lake Union. The pace is breathtaking, and shows no signs of abating. The company [continue reading . . . ]
North Dakota passed Alaska in oil production on a monthly basis two years ago this month. So it is not news that Alaska, long a close second to Texas, remains No. 3. As recently as a decade ago, Alaska pumped almost 36 barrels of oil for every 40 pumped in [continue reading . . . ]
After rising about 11% from the beginning of 2010 through the early months of this year (top chart), China’s currency has suddenly gone into reverse. Buying one yuan, the basic unit of renminbi, would have set you back 16.32 cents around March 10. As of April 25, the same could [continue reading . . . ]
After my talk to CFA Society Spokane last week, a member asked why my presentation didn’t emphasize more good news. I responded that as a former newspaperman, I’m a man-bites-dog type. Dog-bites-man, the ordinary stuff that happens every day, doesn’t make the paper. I’m slow on my feet. In retrospect, [continue reading . . . ]
For my money, the Washington Post‘s Robert Samuelson is one of today’s most accessible economics columnists. Don’t miss his column today. Excerpts: On this Labor Day, American workers face a buyers’ market. Employers have the upper hand and, given today’s languid pace of hiring, the advantage shows few signs of [continue reading . . . ]
Andy Kessler, author and former hedge-fund manager, opines regularly on the op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal. From his piece in the Journal August 28, here’s his nut graph on how to do it: The trick … is to drink from the fire hose of information, take it all in, [continue reading . . . ]