Analysis Topic: Interest Rates and the Bond Market
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Saturday, May 08, 2010
Sovereign Debt Goes Bang! Challenge for Central Banks / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
The Risks from Fiscal Imbalances
The Challenge for Central Banks
Bang, Indeed!
The Center Cannot Hold
A Decent Employment Report
Last week we focused on the first half of a paper by the Bank of International Settlements, discussing what they characterized as the need for "Drastic measures ... to check the rapid growth of current and future liabilities of governments and reduce their adverse consequences for long-term growth and monetary stability." As I noted, you don't often see the term drastic measures in a staid economic paper from the BIS. This week we will look at the conclusion of that paper, and then turn our discussion to the fallout from the problems they discuss, initially in Europe but coming soon to a country near you.
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Friday, May 07, 2010
UK Government Bond Gilts, the Election and the Euro zone / Interest-Rates / UK Debt
(Written BEFORE the Elelction)The Macro Trader’s view:
Today the UK votes in the closest fought General election campaign in living memory. With a hung Parliament still looking the most likely outcome, at least according to the opinion polls, we look at how the Gilt might react once the results are known.
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Wednesday, May 05, 2010
The Subprime Rhyme with U.S. Debt Debacle / Interest-Rates / US Debt
The similarities between the subprime mortgage crisis and that of the coming collapse of the U.S. bond market are uncanny. In fact, Mark Twain may have had the U.S. debt market and the previous debt-fueled real estate crisis in mind when he said that “History does not repeat itself—but it does rhyme.”
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Wednesday, May 05, 2010
Trichet Floods European Banking System With Cash / Interest-Rates / Euro-Zone
After all his tough bulldog talk over the years, the world can now see Trichet is in reality nothing more than a monetarist pussycat when the chips are on the line.
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Monday, May 03, 2010
The Great Interest Rate Explosion of 2010-2011 How to Protect Your Wealth and Profit / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
The dot-com bubble of the late 1990s. The housing bubble of the mid-2000s. They both wreaked massive havoc on investor portfolios. Trillions were lost … both here and abroad.
At Weiss Research, we take pride in the fact we warned of the epic destruction well in ADVANCE of the twin busts in tech stocks and housing.
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Monday, May 03, 2010
What Next for U.S. Treasury Bonds? / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
At the end of March the yield on the ten-year T-note closed at 3.833%, up from 3.617% the month before. Note that at the end of March last year the yield stood at 2.67%.
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Sunday, May 02, 2010
Sovereign Debt Crisis Dominos Are Lining Up to Collapse / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
Boy, what a week! I’ve been warning about a troubled euro and a building sovereign debt crisis for some time. And the bond and currency market activities this past week are a clear example that the momentum is picking up.
There’s a bumpy road ahead … and not just for Greece.
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Sunday, May 02, 2010
Global Debt Crisis Future Public Debt Trajectory Protections / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
There Had to Be a Short
How Should Our Institutions Invest?
The Future Of Public Debt
The Future Public Debt Trajectory
Debt Projections
Everyone and their brother intuitively knows that the current government fiscal deficits in the developed world are unsustainable. They have to be brought under control, but that requires some short-term pain. Today we look at a rather remarkable piece of research from the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) on what the fiscal crisis may morph into in the future, how much pain will be needed, and what will happen if various countries stay on their present courses. Some countries could end up paying north of 20% of GDP just on the interest to serve their debt, within just 30 years.
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Sunday, May 02, 2010
Roast the PIIGS, and End the Euro Debt Crisis / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
"Mankind differs from the animals only by a little and most people throw that away." ~ Confucius, BC 551-479, Chinese Ethical Teacher, Philosopher
The last meltdown was caused by the financial crisis in the United States, which was triggered by the onset of the housing and mortgage crisis. We now have the potential for a full blown currency crisis to unfold. Greek debt has been reduced to junk status and both Spain and Portugal have had their ratings lowered.
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Saturday, May 01, 2010
U.S. Treasury Bond Market Update / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
That darned bond market just won’t give up the ghost! So much to write about this week in so little space! Another record amount of supply (close to $130 Billion) was auctioned without a hiccup last week. The bond auctions were overshadowed by the FOMC meeting and some further supportive data on the fundamental front.
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Friday, April 30, 2010
EXTEND & PRETEND: Uncle Sam, You Sly Devil! / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2010
The modus operandi (MO) of deviant behavior aids investigators in doing criminal profiling. Forensic accounting takes a similar approach and leads us to some unnerving conclusions about Uncle Sam. As Tax Payers we place our sacred trust in our elected officials and government. Is that trust being handled similarly to how Goldman Sachs apparently has been handling its fiduciary responsibilities?Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, April 30, 2010
Greece Armageddon, Financial Ebola Sweeps Through Global Bond Markets / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
What does the end of the bond market world look like? Something like this …
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Friday, April 30, 2010
The Phenomenon of Interest / Interest-Rates / Economic Theory
It has been shown that time preference is a category inherent in every human action. Time preference manifests itself in the phenomenon of originary interest, i.e., the discount of future goods as against present goods.
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Thursday, April 29, 2010
Greece Bond Market Crash, Europe and ETFs / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
When Americans hear about Greece, the first thought that comes to mind is usually “ancient history.” Now Greece is all over the headlines for its financial woes.
But if truth be told, Greece hasn’t done anything different from many other countries, including the U.S.! The government simply spent too much money, the citizens enjoyed too many overly-generous social programs, and eventually the bill came due. Now someone has to pay up — and the Greeks don’t have the cash.
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Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Greek Debt Crisis Won’t Spawn Second Global Financial Crash / Interest-Rates / International Bond Market
Martin Hutchinson writes: The Greek debt crisis is starting to display an uncanny resemblance to the subprime crisis that sank the U.S. housing market, sent the global economy into a tailspin and touched off the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Greece Government Bond Market Panic Crash, Yields Hit 18%, Portugal Next? / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
It did not take too long for contagion to spread (one day), smack in the face of EU statements that contagion was no risk. Why the EU would put themselves in a position to look so foolish is beyond me. Here is a series of articles to consider.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Portugal Suffering Greek Debt Contagion / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
Nothing new to long time readers as we've pointed out repeatedly that the newest, and biggest bubble of them all is the government debt bubble. [Feb 5, 2010: Sovereign Risk Chart - Where Would the US Fit in, on Europe's Scale?] In a world fixated only on benefits, and could care less of the costs as long as they are borne by taxpayers, very few seem to care these days. It is now the ethos that whatever the problem, a central bank or government will throw a country's populace under the bus to "solve" it.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Possible Misunderstandings about Municipalities and their Bonds / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
Problems of state and municipal finance worsen. Governors announce new spending cuts at press conferences but inspire little confidence. The fury of emergency announcements leaves the listener (as well as the governors) in a daze. Research reports offer broad explanations but have left bondholders, as well as employees and local residents, unprepared for discontinuities. In other words, there will be instances when these constituencies will find themselves marched to the slaughterhouse without warning.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
U.K. Mortgage Interest Rates at Lowest Level in a Year / Interest-Rates / Mortgages
When bank base rate dropped to 0.50% last year the mortgage market entered unchartered waters. Initial reductions in mortgage rates were soon wiped out as lenders took an increasing margin for risk.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
The Greek Debt Tragedy From Banks to Sovereigns Back to Banks / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis
Back and recovering from my Strategic Investment Conference this weekend (where I decided to give myself permission not to write my usual letter, but I promise I will be back at it this next Friday!) I have spent some time pondering what we learned. It was a fabulous conference. Lacy Hunt, Dr. Gary Shilling, David Rosenberg, Niall Ferguson, Paul McCulley, George Friedman, former Fed Senior Economist Jason Cummins (who is now Chief Economist for Brevan Howard, the largest European hedge fund, and who was quite impressive), Jon Sundt of Altegris, and your humble analyst were all in top form. I must admit with a little pride that I think this is the finest speaker lineup for ANY investment conference anywhere. We were given a lot to think about.
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