Europe

Can Truth Prevail?

Paul Craig Roberts

According to official US economic data, the US Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has expanded for 22 quarters, raising real GDP 12.1% above its high prior to the 2008-09 economic contraction. Yet, US manufacturing output and US industrial production have not recovered to their pre-contraction high.

So what is driving the real GDP growth? In my opinion, the rise in real GDP is an illusion produced by the under-measurement of inflation.

The currency markets are signalling that a massive shift might be about to happen.

According to a Bank of America/ Merrill Lynch fund manager survey, the US Dollar ($USD) is the single most crowded trade on the planet.

In a fiat world, the value of a given currency is based on where it trades relative to other currencies. In the case of the $USD, the Euro comprises 56% of the basket of currencies against which the $USD is valued.

Put another way, whatever happens to the Euro will effectively trigger an inverse reaction in the $USD.

The month of February was a mixed to positive among a broad sample of assets.

Via George Friedman and Jacob Shapiro of MauldinEconomics.com,

On Wednesday, Jean-Claude Juncker's European Commission released a "White Paper On the Future Of Europe" which comes at a time of extensive tensions with the departing UK, and which lays out what Juncker believe are the "main challenges and opportunities for Europe in
the coming decade." It presents five scenarios for how the Union could