A fair amount to cover going into the Fed announcement on rates tomorrow. For now, the money centers on “no change” but, of course, a “hot” CPI number could blow all that. Let’s unwrap that pickle first: The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.1 percent in November on a seasonally adjusted basis, … Read More
From the top of the heap: The Fed Open Market Committee gavels in tomorrow morning, about this time. Which is a serious point of hype for markets. Consider for example: “Nothing Money” (Bitcoins, based on made-up numbers) made a run at the $45,000 level this weekend. But they failed and dropped under the $42.500 mark … Read More
There are two kinds of Home Handy-Bastard shoppers out at this time of year. The kind who are dirt-under-the-fingernails working bozo’s (like us). And the non-handy, but infinitely more refined who see dirty fingernails, curl up their noses, furrow the brows, and screech “Eeoow, YUCK! Don’t come near me until you… [inserts list of conditions].” … Read More
Today we consider investment lessons from the field of software design. And, in particular a parallel between stock market decision matrices and software decision-making related to voice response devices such as Alexa and Siri. I know, sounds a little bit “out there” but (trust me, it is) it’s actually how modern engineering works. Clever generalization … Read More
No question about it, the insanity of the stock market seems to be inexplicable. But, in one sense, it’s not. America has a savings problem. The problem simplifies to “Where do you park money? I look at the problems faced by our kids – well, now 50-ish, maybe “kids” isn’t the right word. But “Where to save money” has … Read More
Although we don’t offer financial advice, we do nevertheless write and opine on both economics in general, the long waves within economics, and some of our own independent research very specifically. Thus, we feel somewhat driven to announce this is likely to be the transition into? Deadly Downside Day We begin in the general economics … Read More
Money is what “floats your boat” in today’s second installment of our Ark building book. Because while “prepping” may be popular, what’s really satisfying is the larger context in life: Building a Personal Ark to sail into the unknowable future. We aren’t building a Noah-like flood building, though. Rather we are looking at owning a … Read More
Reader Note: I made a couple of changes to the site you may notice, depending on caffeine loading. The first is the home page is now two columns (except on phones) so you can scan what’s going on more quickly. The other change is to underline links in our content, so it’s (more) clear you’re … Read More
The study of Long Wave economics is always complicated. Because there is such an abundance of data to make sense of. You take the stock market of today. We should not be this high. And yet, on this Monday we have all three possible Futures (good, bad, and indifferent) laid out in the charts before us. … Read More
Ham Radio Focus today. You don’t need a license to read, though. And lots of hints, kinks, tweaks, and special sauce secrets along the way. We have been in something approaching “recovery mode” since our consigliere left Tuesday and headed back to the (chillier) Northeast. Leaving me no “second eyes” and “second set of hands” … Read More
With markets at new (nominal) highs this weekend, a look to see where the runaway train is headed seems to make sense. Will we hit a turn and “jump the tracks?” As we ponder this, the Russians have gained more ground in the area of Donetsk where future-critical petroleum reserves are located. Plus now we’re … Read More
Several items of note today, hence this odd update. First is – as we told you to expect – Fed Chair Jay Powell is not rolling over on rates. In fact, in a speech today he went to far as to say: The FOMC is strongly committed to bringing inflation down to 2 percent over … Read More
Seems to us like a good discussion today would revolve around the three flavors of Future that are seen laying out before us. First comes the Very-Near Future. Like the rest of today and into the early weekend. Intermediate-Future, from 2 or 3 days out and going into the New Year. Then most perplexing of all … Read More