Tag Archives: Interest rates

The worst interest rate upturn since 1994 is likely to produce the worst housing downturn in over a decade No economic news of note today; but tomorrow we will see housing permits and starts for March, and on Wednesday existing home sales. So let’s take an important look at housing. The recent increase in mortgage rates to over 5% is the most serious interest rate threat to housing in at least the past 30 years. As the below graph shows, the...

Sergio Cesaratto – Those Italian subsidies for Germany December 8, 2021 Economics, EU politics, EU-Institutions, Finance, Inequality, National Politics, Regulation Italy has paid for certain ill-advised policies of the ECB – influenced by Berlin, the dominant power in Europe – with dozens of points of additional debt/GDP and finding itself ever poorer, while Germany symmetrically gained. Sergio Cesaratto teaches European monetary and fiscal...

August housing construction shows stabilization, following interest rate moderation This morning’s report on August housing permits and starts shows that the stabilizing of mortgage rates in the past few months has now stabilized housing construction. Housing starts increased 3.9% m/m, and total permits increased 6.0%. The less volatile single-family permits increased 0.6%. As a result, the overall trend for all three metrics for the past...

by Joseph Joyce Will A Rise in Interest Rates Lead to a New Debt Crisis? The question of when the Federal Reserve will begin to reverse its loose policy stance continues to be a topic of widespread speculation. At last month’s meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, its members showed a willingness to cut back on asset purchases in 2022 and to raise interest rates in 2023 but kept monetary policy on its current setting due to slower...

It seems the IMF aviary has turned on the hawks and embraced the deficit owls. Has the IMF joined the policy shift to MMT? Yes, in part, but it appears to be a viral form of MMT: according to Vitor Gaspar, the IMF’s head of fiscal policy, “Nations’ first priority should be vaccination, while the reduction of public debt is now far down the list of urgent actions… the main role of fiscal policy in the immediate future should be to be stimulative, to help restore economic growth, reduce...

It seems the IMF aviary has turned on the hawks and embraced the deficit owls. Has the IMF joined the policy shift to MMT? Yes, in part, but it appears to be a viral form of MMT: according to Vitor Gaspar, the IMF’s head of fiscal policy, “Nations’ first priority should be vaccination, while the reduction of public debt is now far down the list of urgent actions… the main role of fiscal policy in the immediate future should be to be stimulative, to help restore economic growth, reduce...

"Britain nearly went bust in March, says Bank of England", reads a headline in the Guardian. In similar vein, the Telegraph's Business section reports "UK finances were close to collapse, says Governor":Eh, what? The Governor of the Bank of England says the UK nearly turned into Venezuela? Well, that's what the Telegraph seems to think: The Bank of England was forced to save the Government from potential financial collapse as markets seized up at the height of the coronavirus crisis,...

"Britain nearly went bust in March, says Bank of England", reads a headline in the Guardian. In similar vein, the Telegraph's Business section reports "UK finances were close to collapse, says Governor":Eh, what? The Governor of the Bank of England says the UK nearly turned into Venezuela? Well, that's what the Telegraph seems to think: The Bank of England was forced to save the Government from potential financial collapse as markets seized up at the height of the coronavirus crisis,...

"USD-backed stablecoin is 10x better than your savings account," runs the headline on an unsolicited press release in my inbox yesterday. And it goes on to explain: The average interest rate for savings accounts in the US currently stands at 0.09%, with some German banks even charging negative interest rates. Universal Protocol, a coalition of leading blockchain organizations, including Uphold, Cred, Blockchain at Berkeley, and Bittrex Global, has recently introduced interest rates of 10%...