Friday, September 13, 2019

The stupid things politicians say.

DRAGHI SAYS NEGATIVE RATES VERY POSITIVE FORCE ON GROWTH.

Yesterday the E.U. cut interest rates making them more negative and this is what they try to sell people? If negative interest rates were so positive - why isn't that the norm not the exception? This is the kind of crap they were trying to convince people of in the last recession.

Look, I don't know what I going to happen with our economy regarding this - but it freaks me the hell out when Australia is toying with negative interest rates. Normally I would say this could never happen here, but country after country is falling into them.

"Australia is staring down the barrel of a recession and the RBA is running out of ways to rescue us, paving the way for some “truly bizarre” monetary policy."

10 comments:

  1. Soooo, what does one do with their money?

    I am sitting with most of my assets (other than the house) in cash as I don't believe the accounting put out by most companies.

    Negative interest rates will force me into buying things that I can touch - real estate, gold, silver, etc. Beans and bullets?

    I have been stewing over this for almost a year and still haven’t come to a scenario that makes me comfortable.

    I am starting to get nervous about how the various taxing authorities will act if this all comes crashing down.

    Makes me want to drill a water well and install solar panels on my property.

    Will real estate go up as people look to move into hard assets? Many questions and no clear answers.

    BunnyGoat


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  2. "I am sitting with most of my assets (other than the house) in cash as I don't believe the accounting put out by most companies."

    OMG. Same. But I think I've been doing it for about two years. I thought this would come crashing down faster, but it did take about three years the first recession. It's only been by sheer force of the Trump administration that it hasn't.

    We came close under Obama, which is how I wound up with a nihilist Audi. And also why I realized the stock market would become really distorted. I started looking around at the landscape of where you might put your money.

    I don't need another nihilist Audi, and generally think even though I did it - it was an insane thing to do.

    I wouldn't touch the stock market with a 10 foot pole at this point. Usually doing nothing is doing something, but right now I don't even know how this plays out. I don't think anyone does. Maybe we are going to have to finally pay for the big fat Obama bubble. The everything bubble. I don't know what the are going to do.

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  3. The other day I took a look at gasoline prices in 1972 (.35) and ran them thru an inflation calculator, that's $2.25 in 2019 dollars. Wow! It isn't gasoline that costs more, it's my dollar is worth way less than it was.

    With that thought in mind for the most part, a well & solar panels are not a bad investment! Everyone needs water and solar is magic!

    The other thing that comes to mind is that everyone needs a place to live. A shrinking dollar that buys a rental will stop shrinking and that rental ought to give you cash every month from now on.

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  4. That is not really as easy as it sounds. I have a rental. You pay a full percentage higher for houses you don't live in. So if rates are at 3.5% your rental is going to be 4.5%. I never planned to be a landlord, and you have to be pretty calloused to tolerate it. I finally found a good property manager, but I went though a lot of crap before that. I wouldn't say it's for the faint of heart.

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  5. I simply don't understand the idea of negative interest rates except as a tool to legally rob people of their money. I guess that's the idea. What's disgusting is how many academic economist endorse this crap. They might as well be communist.

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  6. That's what happens when you have an recovery based on vaporware (credit). I mean, look at all of these companies going IPO with negative revenue. No one feels they need to make money for the saver or investor.

    Once my credit union sent out emails saying - we make money ~for you~ - ~not off you~. And I was so shocked at the time. I was like - oh YEAH. Thats how banks ~used~ to operate.

    For the record I don't think Trump actually wants negative rates. Rich people make money off of interest. I think that he just has no choice right now.

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  7. This is all it took for NYMEX/WTI spot crude to climb over $8 on Monday.

    Roughly 15% to 20% of its value, in other words.

    Obiwan Snackbar of the GCC Clone Fleet: "These blast points are much too precise for Houthis".

    The Houthis: "Hey, everyone, it wasn't us, those blast points are much too precise for us."

    The Iranians: "We dindunuffin man! We dindunuffin!"

    The GCC coalition: *snort* "STOP PULLING OUR OTHER ONE."

    Some leftover hawk in the Beltway: "Just how much in conventional explosives would it take for us to 'sweep and clear' the international shipping obstacle known as the island of Tunb?"

    The Iranians: "You wouldn't."

    Of course, the number one reason for the drone strikes would in fact be to raise oil prices so the Global Terrorist Regime of Iran doesn't sail onward into the same kind of budget crisis that the Sah-oodies have already sailed into ...

    Meanwhile, the Emiratis aren't stupid: "A recession is coming so hoard your dirhams [UAE money] and don't panic.

    BTW, this news comes to you from The National in the UAE only because they had a full spread of satellite photos and because they're not quite as brazenly open a mouthpiece for the USG as most of the American domestic media.

    PANIC NOW AND FILL UP YOUR GAS TANK

    :-)

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  8. I don't know - when gas gets too cheap it seems someone always finds a way to blow something up or go on strike. Pretty much like clockwork.

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  9. And the next day (Tuesday) ...

    Prices reset so half of the previous day's gain was wiped out.

    Trading volumes for NYMEX/WTI crude were really low on Monday -- trading volumes weren't even 10% of normal. With nobody buying at absurd prices, the market started to reset.

    With that in mind: want to have some fun with something I'd like to call "Mao in Reverse"?

    Remember how Mao got his countrymen to kill insects in order to get rid of a persistent insect problem in the PRC?

    Americans can do this to the PRC, except this involves two things.

    Eat more pork and find a way how to consume more soybeans, such as eating more of the kinds of meat where soybeans are a feed stock input.

    Apparently the PRC has a "strategic pork reserve" and because of interesting historical characteristics of the Chinese diet, the bulk of their protein sources today consists of pork and soybeans.

    I'd join everyone in a Grand Patriotic American Pork Binge for purely Texan reasons(*) except for the fact that the amount of pork required would definitely send me to the hospital, if not somewhere else a bit more drastic.

    So I'll just have to up my consumption of tofu and tempeh for a while.

    :-)

    ...

    (*) "... purely Texan reasons": Because we can and it gives us great mirth and feelings of happiness, Texans pseudo-randomly fuck with people not so much to prove a point or to say anything with any meaning, but just to remind them that we can. If we do this with people we like, this is generally a sign that you have been accepted into the Friends of Texans Club.

    This is of course why I called you a Californian instead of a denizen of Sparkly Vampire County, Washington -- I knew that'd trigger your "projection" defenses, and so I just had to do this Because Texan. :-)

    Also, if you do this in Florida, they just tell you to hold their beer so they can show you how it's done Florida Man and Florida Woman style.

    Besides, I see you as a future denizen of Cary, North Carolina, although you'll have to be careful there: when the ladies talk about how their grass is growing, they're talking fescue. :-)

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  10. "... purely Texan reasons": Because we can and it gives us great mirth and feelings of happiness, Texans pseudo-randomly fuck with people not so much to prove a point or to say anything with any meaning, but just to remind them that we can. If we do this with people we like, this is generally a sign that you have been accepted into the Friends of Texans Club."

    I get it. I've become slightly fluent in man because I have a husband. Men like to start treating women they like - like they do their buddies. And dudes just like to screw with each other and punch each other in the balls. Guys love the reaction, but women tolerate that less well. Guys tend to poke us until we get mad, which is what is fun for guys. Not as much for girls. Then you wonder why we get all mad.

    And FWIW - you aren't technically a real Texan according to Texan rules. You are at least a Washington Transplant. But go on with your bad self. ;)

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