Last Thursday the October reading for the Leading Economic Index (LEI) was released and it showed a decline of 0.1% for the month. Such a small decline doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it was the third straight monthly decline for the indicator and the September reading was adjusted downward from -0.1% to -0.2%. […] Read more

It’s interesting when the cream rises to the top of an economic society it is questioned, and rightly so in a republic, for its virtues. It is easy to look in the rearview mirror and point fingers at the billionaires who changed the way the bourgeoisie lives. Liz Warren (friends call her Liz) believes that […] Read more

It is what is known in financial circles as “helicopter money,” and, economically speaking it has usually been looked at as a very bad idea. However, more recently some well-respected financial experts are looking to the concept as a way to avoid the current path to a recession that many believe President Trump has put […] Read more

Investors and economists have been showing concern about the economy for some time now. Different signs have been cropping up here and there, and that helped pressure the Fed into making a rate cut at the end of July. One particular signal that I have been tracking for almost a year now is the 2/10 […] Read more

I wrote a bullish piece on gold for Seeking Alpha last September 6. My main argument for the bullish posture was the commitment of traders report. If you’re not familiar with the commitment of traders report, it is released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission each Friday and it shows the net positions of three different […] Read more

The Trump Presidency has been anything but predictable. In the last few weeks, we have seen President Trump announce new tariffs on Chinese goods and then backtrack and cancel some through the holidays. Of course, the backtracking came after the stock market reacted in a very negative fashion. In the last few days, we have […] Read more

Is it just me, or are the peaks on my bar of Toblerone chocolate growing conspicuously less numerous? Wait, hold on. I’m pretty sure that roll of Charmin toilet paper used to have 500 single-ply sheets. Now it has only 451. What’s going on here? This is known in the world of retail economics as […] Read more

The federal government has a problem with debt and deficit spending, as well as a future funding crisis in Social Security and Medicare. And Bernie Sanders wants to give it to you for free. At a point in the not so distant future, the well will run dry for the feds, as baby boomers suck […] Read more

Earlier today the European Central Bank announced that it would keep its key interest rate where it is for now, but made it clear that there was a rate cut on the horizon and that other stimulus will be considered as well. The current rate for the ECB is -0.4%. That’s right, it’s in negative […] Read more