Grim Economic News from Mexico and Canada
March 18, 2009
NAFTA ties Canada and Mexico closely to U.S. economic trends. As one might expect, the U.S. dog is wagging the tails of its northern and southern neighbors, as data released today attest. Canadian wholesale sales fell by 4.2% in both value and volume terms in January. The automotive sector dominated the report, with nominal sales […] More
Fed Delves More Deeply Into Quantitative Easing
March 18, 2009
The FOMC announced more dramatic steps than anticipated but left the federal funds target at a 25-basis point range centered on 0.125% rather than drop such to a point target of zero as Japan did when it eased quantitatively earlier this decade. Steps being taken by the Fed to get credit to the housing market […] More
How the U.S. Current Account Deficit Was Funded Last Quarter and in 2008
March 18, 2009
The table below compares funding of the U.S. current account deficit in 4Q08 to the three prior quarters and its funding in calendar 2008 to that in calendar 2007. The deficit hovered around 5% of GDP in the first three quarters of last year but declined sharply to 3.7% of GDP in the final quarter. […] More
Central Bank Watch
Vital Market Signs When FOMC Has Met Previously
March 18, 2009
When today’s FOMC announcement is released at around 14:15 EDT (18:15 GMT), Fed watchers by and large do not expect any significant surprises to break the pattern of highly transparent FOMC announcements. In this use, transparency means that other means of communication between formal FOMC meetings have been utilized to prepare markets to expect whatever […] More
Central Bank Watch
Bank of Japan Review: Mixed Signals
March 18, 2009
The Bank of Japan, which had thus far from peak cut its overnight target rate by just 40 basis points, kept such at 0.1% rather than revert to zero or switch the operative target from a rate to a quantitative measure like excess reserves. Officials deliberated for six hours and six minutes over two days. […] More
New Overnight Developments Abroad - Daily Update
New Overnight Developments Abroad: Spotlight on Central Banks
March 18, 2009
The dollar jumped 1.2% against sterling following extremely weak British labor market data and the release of Bank of England minutes revealing unanimous support for quantitative easing in which the Monetary Policy Committee agreed to buy Gbp 75 billion of medium- to long-dated Gilts. The yen is unchanged against the yen despite the Bank of […] More
