With the markets awash with volatility these past few weeks, everyone is looking around for culprits and for saviors. The global economic recovery is once again faltering, as China’s engine of growth is sputtering and the rest of the world is worried about the consequences. As is becoming the norm in the post 2008 environment, central bankers are at the…
Big Move in China's Yuan Today! Value of the Chinese currency, the yuan, against the US dollar. Source: Bloomberg Global markets woke excited today after China’s central bank surprised the world by “forcing” a 1.9% weakening of its currency. Most currencies in the world move in a relatively free fashion, i.e. without significant intervention by a country’s central bank. A 2% one-day…
Back in the summer of 2013, when I was managing over US$10 billion in emerging markets (EM) fixed income assets, I looked around the industry at my fellow EM portfolio managers and saw a stunned group. In early May that year, Ben Bernanke shocked the world out of its complacency by announcing that the Federal Reserve was ready to taper its…
Income inequality is a hot topic globally, and a focal point in the U.S. especially after the 2008 financial crisis. Most popular policy prescriptions revolve around the campaign friendly topic of redistributing wealth: tax the rich, and send the money to the poor. In the last several months, many cities, states, and Presidential contenders have seized upon another policy tool:…
After experiencing a bull run for decades, the price of gold has been on an incessant decline since its high in 2011 – and is down a whopping 73% since then. Given prices plummeted around 5% in the last week alone, this shiny metal is making headlines both in popular and financial press. Is it time to buy? Besides its…
Ever play the game Jenga? The game begins with a carefully constructed tower of individual bricks, and then proceeds as each player removes a brick and tries to keep the structure together. Today’s headlines regarding the latest Greek bailout got me thinking about this maddening game, as I imagined Greece being removed from the Eurozone and the whole stack falling…
My Sister Is Greece, I am the Troika There’s always one black sheep in the family. In my family’s case, that sheep is my sister. While my two brothers and I have worked every day of our lives since we were 10 (started on the farm in Minnesota!), my sister has managed to be unemployed for all of her adult…
