Damn It, Janet!
Yellen’s testimony Wed. “was not dovish relative to market expectations,” and didn’t take March off table, Morgan Stanley strategists Matthew Hornbach, Chirag Mirani, Guneet Dhingra write in note.
She “qualified most of the downside risks to the economic outlook with a positive spin,” while implying that tighter financial conditions need to persist in order for Fed’s economic outlook to change
Submitted by Charles Kennedy via OilPrice.com,
Retail gasoline prices have dipped below $2 per gallon across the United States. But gas might drop below $1 per gallon soon in some places of the country.
Aside from the financial crisis, when gasoline prices dropped below $2 per gallon for just a few months, retail gasoline prices have not been below $2 since 2004. Gas prices are at their lowest levels in many years.
With central bankers losing credibility left and right, and failing outright to boost the "wealth effect" no matter what they throw at it, the next big question is when will central planners around the world unveil the cashless society which is a necessary and sufficient condition to a regime of global NIRP.
It's amazing, but nearly a year into the Trump campaign the pundits still don't get it: the louder established members of the broken, crony capitalist status quo rail against Trump, the higher his popularity. And there are few more entrenched crony capitalists than the partner of Barack Obama's "tax advisor", the person who singlehandedly crushed the Keystone XL pipeline project so it would generate more profits for his oil trains, Hillary's number one supporter (perhaps tied with Lloyd Blankfein), Warren Buffet's sidekick Charlie Munger.
Having seen what monetary-policy failure looks like in Japan.. and in the US, we now turn our attention to the world. Amid NIRP temptations, growth fears, and faltering faith in central banker control, market-implied inflation expectations have collapsed to record lows. Worse still, even The Fed's own survey of consumer's inflation expectations has slumped to record lows.
Inflation expectations are collapsing... (US and Europe at record lows - worse than the lows in the middle of the last crisis)...