At the end of March, San Francisco’s Federal Reserve board issued an “economics letter” which argued that “in the coming decades, climate...
Oops. When US president Donald Trump swept to power two years ago, he announced that there was no reason why his administration could not deliver as...
In normal circumstances, Christmas is supposed to be a blissfully boring time for the Federal Reserve — and those analysts paid to watch it.
As a science-fiction-obsessed teenager in the 1980s, “outer space” conjured up images for me of astronauts, rockets, aliens and the novels of...
Sometimes statistics don’t behave as predicted. Take the thorny issue of US-China trade and Donald Trump.
Last month, as the US midterm elections approached, Deutsche Bank analysts released a calculation that should have made American voters wince. It...
When Jay Powell, US Federal Reserve chairman, gave a news conference this week, investors were on red alert about what he might say about the...
There is never a great moment to experience an emerging markets crunch. Right now, however, the timing of the debacles in Argentina and Turkey is...
Do markets look a little weird right now? That is a question many investors might be asking. In recent weeks geopolitical tensions have intensified,...
A year ago, Argentina was the darling of global investors. So much so that, when it issued a pioneering 100-year bond with a yield of just 7.9 per...
When Donald Trump travelled to the World Economic Forum at Davos two months ago, the global business leaders who met him there seemed relieved by...
American markets are spinning on a carousel. As fourth-quarter corporate earnings tumble out this week, analysts are digesting every digit, leaving...
The $160bn Bridgewater hedge fund produced a chart last year about modern politics that was alarming for at least two reasons. First, the number...
The mysteries of bitcoin are turning heads yet again this week. At the start of the year, the digital token was worth $1,000; on Thursday, it...
When Donald Trump arrived in the White House earlier this year, he loved to toss the “i” word around: infrastructure. Little wonder. Mr...
If somebody had suggested a year ago that Gary Cohn, former Goldman Sachs president, might be the next Federal Reserve chair, his colleagues would...
Another week, another wave of sabre-rattling from the Trump administration over trade. Two months ago, it was softwood lumber that grabbed the...
How do you say “credit impulse” in Spanish? Investors might find it sensible to ask this question now. This week, Argentina startled the...
When the US Federal Reserve suggested four years ago that it might start tightening monetary policy, the mere idea sent the markets into a tailspin...
Until last month, Paul Romer, chief economist at the World Bank, was best known for his brilliant research in the field known as “endogenous...
When the White House caravan headed to the Arabian Desert last weekend, Donald Trump’s team were keen to score big “wins”. Stephen Schwarzman,...
What is it about the American economy that keeps hedge fund luminaries awake at night? A couple of weeks ago I put that question to Ken Griffin,...
What are the biggest private sector employers in America today? If you toss that question to most voters or politicians they would probably point to...
For the past two decades Alex Karp, chief executive of Palantir, the data analytics “unicorn” start-up, has seen Silicon Valley bask in...
In recent years Ray Dalio, head of the Bridgewater hedge fund, has penned many high-minded, and hefty, reports on monetary policy, markets and macro...
Debate has been frenzied this week about how fast the US Federal Reserve plans to raise interest rates. But as investors look forward, it is also a...
Until this week the state of Ivanka Trump’s clothing brand was mostly of interest to fashion bloggers. No longer. Last week, the retail chain...
Earlier this week, I was sitting in a New York cab when I spotted a striking new ad from Walmart. For once, it was not promoting cut-price consumer...
Donald Trump this week gave one of the most bizarre press conferences that Washington, or New York, has ever seen. It was not just because of the...
The election of Donald Trump has generated lots of startling statistics. Here is another: Ray Dalio, head of the Bridgewater hedge fund, crunched...
This week executives and government officials across the western world have been frantically clearing their desks before the start of the holidays -...
How should business leaders interpret Donald Trump’s tweets? That question is haunting many corporate boards, in America and around the world.
How can anyone make sense of today’s markets? That is a question many investors might ask. And at last week’s International Monetary...
Tim Cook, Apple chief executive, last month made a tax pledge that caused a frisson among analysts. No, this was not about Irish or European tax;...
Ten years ago when the world’s central bankers gathered in Jackson Hole for their annual retreat in the majestic Teton Range in Wyoming, their...
John Kerry, US secretary of state, unveiled a historic deal with Iran in July 2015. This was supposed to be a key part of the Obama legacy: in...
August has been notable for yet another set of bizarre market signals. Last week the Bank of England cut rates from 0.5 per cent to a record low of...
At the Republican party’s 2012 convention in Tampa, Florida, a gigantic “debt clock” hung over the stage showing how...
A couple of months ago, Barack Obama jumped into the EU referendum debate by suggesting that the UK would be at the “back of the queue”...
When the results of the UK’s EU referendum emerged last Friday morning, the share price of MetLife, the stolid American insurance group,...
Until recently, no one outside the upper echelons of Mc-Kinsey, the consulting firm, knew what the letters “MIO” signified. But this...
In recent years, critics of the US Federal Reserve have grumbled that there have been two shortcomings in how central bank officials analyse the...
Donald Trump loves to disregard political rules. Now he is trying to break yet another: although it has long been customary for American...
This year investors have grappled with a plethora of global mysteries: Brexit, war in the Middle East, negative interest rates, energy prices, the...
Three decades ago, the club of triple A-rated American corporate borrowers was a busy place. About 60 big companies, ranging from Pfizer to General...
There are not many questions on which a man such as Tim Cook, chief executive officer of Apple, would agree with Donald Trump, the upstart...
This week Janet Yellen experienced a classic New York ritual: she addressed the Economic Club of New York about monetary policy, speaking with a...
Four months ago Microsoft scored a cyber coup. Its digital sleuths identified a “botnet”, or fake server, that had installed malware on...
Japanese monetary firepower misses mark There is no easy way to translate the phrase “shoot yourself in the foot” into Japanese. That...
