Weekly Technical Reviews

The current structure of the FOMC was established in 1935 and for decades transcripts of the FOMC meetings were published with a lag of 5 years. In 1995 the FOMC began to publish the minutes of a meeting after the subsequent meeting which was usually 8-9 weeks later. This change was prompted by...

On December 1 a Governor for the Bank of Japan indicated that the BOJ would likely increase their policy rate at the next meeting on December 19. Inflation has been consistently above the BOJ’s 2% target, with the Headline CPI at 3.0% in November and the Core CPI at 3.1%. On November 20 Japan’s...

The S&P 500 topped on October 29 and then pulled back as expectations for another rate cut at the December 10 FOMC meeting dimmed. In his statement before the press conference after the October 29 FOMC meeting, Chair Powell threw cold water on the prospects of a rate cut at the December...

The Great Pyramid of Giza took about 26 years to build and was completed in 2560 BC, give or take a few years. It was 481 feet tall, the base was 756 feet, and was constructed with 2.3 million blocks of limestone with some of them weighing 70 tons. The Great Pyramid of Giza is the oldest of the...

On Sunday 8 Democrats voted with 52 Republicans to move forward and presumably end the longest government shutdown in history. The vote on November 9 came after 14 previous attempts failed. Five additional Democrats agreed to join the three Dems who had voted yes in the prior 14 votes. The...

As expected, the FOMC voted to end its Quantitative Tightening program on December 1, so it will no longer allow $5 billion of Treasury debt a month roll off. The FOMC did vote to continue allowing $35 billion a month of Mortgage-Backed-Securities (MBS) to roll off. The $35 billion will be...

The FOMC will lower the Funds rate by 0.25% when the FOMC meets on Wednesday October 29, which won’t be a surprise to anyone. Financial markets will react positively if the FOMC announces they will be ending their Quantitative Tightening program since this move represents another easing of...

Rare earths are critical minerals used to manufacture magnets, which are key inputs for electric vehicles, the semiconductor industry, and the US military. Rare earths are crucial for various...

In recent weeks the S&P 500 managed to grind higher despite increasing signs of underlying weakness, as measured by the 21-day Advances – Declines Oscillator. On September 15 the S&P 500 closed at 6615 and on October 9 traded up to 6764, an increase of 2.25%. On Friday 3 weeks of gains...

The government shutdown and the suspension of long-standing economic reports is occurring at a potential inflection point in the current business cycle. The Federal Reserve needs to know if the labor market is stabilizing or weakening further and whether inflation is rising more than expected,...